Fashion & Shopping
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The New Allure of Overseas Chinese Influencers | China Decoded, BoF Professional

Holly B. Martin

This season’s fashion weeks may be a turning point for brands’ China-focused marketing strategists, leaving them with a larger, diverse and perhaps more complex network of influencers around the globe.

With ongoing travel restrictions keeping the mainland’s key opinion leaders (KOLs) stuck at home, many brands are filling the marketing void with KOLs living outside China. Not only can overseas KOLs be an attractive alternative for brands readjusting strategies in response to Covid-19′s knock-on effects in the short-term, but they also allow them to diversify their marketing budgets in the wake of Beijing’s recent crackdown on certain celebrity ambassadors and other ostentation in the entertainment industry.

And what the overseas influencers may lack in terms of the high profiles of top China-based KOLs, they want to make up for it in other ways, including a loyal fan base. It’s no surprise then that overseas KOLs are already part and parcel

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Fashion & Shopping
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Marc Jacobs Returns to the Runway | BoF Professional, News & Analysis

Holly B. Martin

American fashion’s greatest showman returned to the runway on Monday, an optimistic sign not only for a weakened New York fashion industry but also for his business, which is turning around after years of struggles.

A mostly maskless crowd of about 100 guests (proof of vaccination was required) were in attendance for Marc Jacobs’ first runway show since February 2020, which took place inside the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.

“While the world continues to change with unimaginable speed, my love for fashion, the desire to create and share collections through this delivery system — the runway — endures,” wrote Jacobs in the show notes.

Last May, the designer told BoF’s Tim Blanks that he was unsure whether he would go back to runway shows at all, remarking that he was one of the only major designers still left on the schedule. The Council of

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Fashion & Shopping
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Does Chanel’s Stance on E-Commerce Make Sense? | This Week in Fashion, BoF Professional

Holly B. Martin

The pandemic hit fashion’s biggest luxury players hard. But it hit Chanel worst of all, according to figures released by the French luxury giant this week.

The company’s sales sagged 18 percent last year, slightly under-performing LVMH and Kering and significantly lagging accessories powerhouse Hermès. It’s the first time the privately held Chanel has failed to record double-digit growth since it started publishing financial results four years ago. Operating profit plummeted 41 percent.

Like its luxury rivals, the company suffered as stores closed in key markets and normally high-spending international tourists were grounded. Chanel was particularly vulnerable because a comparatively large proportion of its business is driven by sales of cosmetics and perfume that were hard hit by the decline in travel retail.

But the company faced another handicap: unlike brands such as Dior, Louis Vuitton and Gucci, Chanel doesn’t sell its core fashion and accessories products online, so when

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Fashion & Shopping
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How China’s New Love Affair With Perfume Is Changing the Market | China Decoded, BoF Professional

Holly B. Martin

China dominates almost every aspect of the consumer market: it is the world’s biggest apparel market; the biggest luxury market; the biggest source of growth for fashion and beauty brands the world over.

But fragrance has remained an anomaly. As of 2017, only one percent of worldwide perfume sales happened in China, and less than one percent of Chinese consumers used perfume daily, according to market research firm Mintel. But that’s changing fast, thanks to a new generation of consumers, who are adopting perfume as a way to express their personal style.

Now it’s obvious that the ones who aren’t using fragrance, just aren’t using it yet.

“The youngsters are all so much about wanting to tell who they are and why they are unique. Fragrance is the ideal way to convey who you want to be in a really subtle way,” said Dao Nguyen, founder of Essenzia, a boutique

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