Mark TungateFashion Brands: Branding Style from Armani to Zara

I own this book in two different languages: yes, I bought the French Edition too!!! Tungate as always dissects the Industry and reveals exclusive Insights from the Fashion Insiders. This is what I like the most of all his Books, his "Behind the Scene" Style.I really liked the Sections devoted to "Haute Couture meets High street" and "the Anatomy of a Trend: The Style Bureaus, The Cool Hunters and the new Oracles". I think that "Fashion Brands - Branding Style from Armani to Zara" is a Wardrobe Essential and full of sure conversation pieces to share at Parties!Rich with detail and Simply eloquent. I give 5 Stars to the Book!

From the title, description and earlier reviews of the book I was really hopeful that this would be an interesting, educational read. Very far off the mark, it seems. As someone with experience in brand consulting and marketing, I found the book to be shockingly below what I would find acceptable, educational, or useful. The only two uses I can see for it are as reading material for someone, who knows absolutely nothing of the industry (and I hope there are better examples out there even for that), or as a quick way to make oneself speak the right language and be able to superficially converse about relevant topics in order to pass a job interview for the industry.First of all the title, which at least led me to believe that the stated goal of the book was to cover fashion brands from A to Z. That is not the case and the myth got dispelled immediately upon opening it. Be that as it may, I would still have enjoyed, what the book was actually supposed to do (rather than what was implied in the title), if it was actually done well.It's described as 'snappy and journalistic' on the front flap and that actually does describe it fairly well. It's journalistic in the sense that it is a cobbling together of some interviews, a couple of dozen of articles from daily papers (which themseves are based on interviews, mostly), and presented as the ultimate wisdom. On top of that it is badly fawning, so there really is no difference between the book and some fashion magazines, whichthe author accuses of this behaviour. The book is in essence more of an advertorial than a piece of independent, compelling research.Some brands - one would imagine the ones giving better access to interviewees, or the ones the author is more a fan of - receive disproportionately more attention and less scrutiny is accorded to the statements of their spokespeople. Another aspect that is mildly annoying is that several stories get repeated on more than one occasion, pointing to a less than effective editing process.The reason why I accorded the book two stars, though, is that it falls so far short of its stated goal of being a primer on how fashion brands work that it is not even funny. While the book covers many areas that are of importance in the fashion business (it falls way short of being comprehensive in this respect), there is no analysis, just a reporting of what usually one or two people per chapter have thought about this specific aspect. The chapters - say on the impact of stores, use of celebrities, etc. - are neither coherent case studies, which would allow for drawing conclusions, nor are they conducted on a cross industry analysis basis in order to see what works for whom and why.Any analysis is completely absent from the book. The author will strongly advocate one point, devote almost an entire chapter to it, then let it slip that it did not work in the case he is describing, but nevermind, it still works generally - something that needs to be taken on trust. It is based primarily on the principle that if these are the things someone in the fashion industry is doing, these things must work and must be the things that one needs to do. Marketing has moved away from this vodoo approach quite some time ago and either the fashion business is very slow to catch up, or alternatively, the author did not give the topic the necessary attention, which is probably more likely. Presenting results of some proper analysis of when certain approaches work, which ones work best for what kind of brands, what are the surrounding factors that make them more or less effective, would have made this book really a proper primer for the industry. As it is, the few numbers that are included are largely irrelevant, often contradictory, almost never comparable, and on several occasions demostrate a shocking level of innumeracy, as well as a complete absence of common sense of anyone who uses them, unless the purpose is pure propaganda.On top of that the 'second, revised edition' basically means a small added subchapter and nothing more. One would have expected that the earlier chapters get updated, where necessary but that apparently was not the brief. So looking at badly out of date sources (of questionable quality - but then again the author could at least have brought them up to date) peppering the book throughout - with two exceptions everything was published pre-2005 - is annoying. No subsequent research appears to have been done for the second edition, which just smacks of laziness.The endorsement on the front cover promises that this is 'an essential primer for anyone wanting to make it big in the fashion biz.' Unless ths is meant to mean sell out and slavishly follow whatever the fashion industry feeds you, I cannot see how the book would do the description justice.What it is, though, is a good, quick way to equip oneself with sufficient anecdotal evidence about what is going on in the industry, and potentially even what the topics of discussion are, to perform adequately in a job interview for the industry, which is the only real purpose I see for this book. It will allow one to speak in sufficiently adulatory tones, provide a variety of topics one can converse about, make one potentially appear knowledgeable in a group of people who are totally ignorant. But even that I would not stretch - it's one thing to know what the topics are and roughly what the structure of the industry is, quite another to be able to discuss what is important, or what works, and why.

This book gives a lot of interesting, insider information about different fashion brands, both premium as well as high street brands. Very good for anybody who is interested in understanding more about the industry. It is not academical at all, more like a nicely written research, with interesting facts. A bit British in writing style.