Richest man

Chapter 12 Europe: Amancio Ortega Gona (1)
——Amancio Ortega Gona: The speed of a kingdom In the world fashion industry, the 69-year-old Inditex Group President Amancio Ortega Gona's net worth is second only to the French fashion industry giant , Louis Vuitton Group boss Bernardo Arnault, but his reputation may only be one-thousandth of Bernardo Arnault - except of course in Spain. On July 2004, 7, at the "Spanish Famous Trademark Forum" held in Madrid, when Ortega, the founder and president of Inditex, was appointed as the honorary ambassador of "Spanish Brands", the richest man in Spain began to become more famous. The focus of many people's attention.

Ortega, 69, seems to prefer to live outside his social circle - he never gives media interviews, refuses to wear a tie and prefers to wear blue jeans.Even though his company has more than 48 chain stores and more than 2000 employees in 2005 countries and regions around the world, he still stubbornly sets the company headquarters in La Coruña, an unknown small city in the northwest of Spain, and never Advertise for a penny for your own chain. In 126, he ranked 23rd on the Forbes Global Rich List with a net worth of US$[-] billion, and became the well-deserved richest man in Spain.

Ortega's wealth mainly comes from the fashion retail industry, which is known as the world's most difficult industry. The clothing brands under the Inditex Group he owns include Zara, Massimo Dutti, Pull & Bear, Bershka, Stradivarius and Oysho Among them, Zara is the largest and most profitable department of Inditex Group, with annual sales accounting for 78% of the group's total sales.

The starting point of Ortega's wealth myth was at 2001:7 am on July 1, 11. For most people, this may be a very ordinary morning. The shares of Inditex Holding Group were listed on the Madrid Stock Exchange for the first time. The price per share soared from 15 euros to 14.70 euros on the day of trading, an increase of 18.00%, making the company's market value reach 22.45 billion euros.In the case of the slow development of the European clothing market, the increase in Inditex's stock after listing is considered a miracle for the world's fashion industry.On the day of the listing, when Ortega, who was 92 years old, staggered out of his office in an industrial area in the Port of A Coruña in northwest Spain, he owned most of the shares of Inditex Holding Group, and he already owned 65 billion dollar wealth.He has since sold a 60% stake for $26 billion in cash.

What was even more deified by the Spanish media at that time was another thing.Although the son of a railway worker and housewife is now the second richest man in the fashion industry by total wealth in the world, there was not even a single article about him in any Spanish newspaper before then, and he was never in Appear in front of the media.Later, someone found two photos of him, one of which was the first report on Inditex’s listing in 2003, and the other was a picture of the report after Inditex’s stock listing, and what is more interesting is that these two photos The chubby Ortega - Spain's richest man - was wearing the same dress.

默默无闻的奥尔特加经过30多年的努力把Inditex从一个家庭式服装作坊变成了一个实力强大的集团，属下六个专业服装品牌分别面向不同的消费群体。Inditex的利润增长在1996年至2000年间超过3倍，在2001年达到31%，而这一年世界范围内许多服装连锁店看到的则是销售和利润的双双崩溃。

Ortega, who owned US$2001 billion in 60, ranked 2004rd on the Forbes Global Rich List with a net worth of US$92 billion in 33. In 2005, his wealth increased to US$126 billion.Now, this low-key old man has become the pride of the whole of Spain. His lifelong experience in fashion marketing has turned into a marketing strategy that can set off a revolution in the world's manufacturing industry.The uniqueness of his wealth myth lies in this: In today’s globalization, Ortega overthrows the taken-for-granted “relentless pressure of globalization” with his unique “fashion speed” mode, and he uses first-rate fashion, second-rate High-quality manufacturing and third-rate prices have educated the "fashion" manufacturers who are still making copies today.

From shirt delivery man to chain store owner
Ortega was born on March 1936, 3 in Leon, Spain.His family was poor, his father was a railway worker and his mother was a housewife. At the age of 28, he started working as a handyman in a clothing store in La Coruña in northwestern Spain. His first job was to deliver shirt samples.Ortega is very studious. During his part-time job, he gradually discovered that the process of designing a piece of clothing to making it, and then putting it on the shelves of the store contains huge profits.He realized that if he worked hard, he, too, could one day make money from it.La Coruña, where Ortega works, is a traditional textile and garment industry center in Spain. There, people have many opportunities to master the complete business process of fashion from design, processing to wholesale and retail. Ortega likes to personally Participate in the design and production of clothing.

In 1963, 27-year-old Ortega opened a clothing factory in La Coruña based on what he had learned in a clothing store, specializing in the production of women's pajamas, and the products were sold directly to clothing wholesalers. In 1975, a German customer temporarily canceled a large order. In order to dispose of the pajamas that had been produced according to the order, Ortega opened the first Zara retail store in this small town.It was this accidental experience that made Ortega realize the importance of the "marriage" of production and the market, and Ortega's road to wealth opened inadvertently.

In the next ten years, Ortega began to open Zara brand chain stores continuously, and its sales network began to extend to major cities in Spain. In 1985, Ortega formed the Inditex holding company as the parent company of his companies.

In the next ten years, under the operation of Ortega, the Inditex Group continued to expand. In the 20s, Inditex Group began to rapidly expand overseas markets. In 80, Zara opened its first overseas branch in Portugal, and then began to develop to other European countries, North America, Latin America, Asia and Africa.By 1988, the 2004th branch of Inditex Group opened in Hong Kong.So far, its sales business has extended to more than 2000 countries and regions around the world.

While expanding abroad, Inditex is committed to developing more brand series in order to meet the needs of different target customer groups.Ortega introduced Pull & Bear in 1991, offering casual wear for men.Massimo Dutti, which was launched in the same year, is a high-end men's formal wear brand in the group. Compared with its competitors, it has a clear price advantage. In 1995, on the basis of the development of the above two brands, Ortega entered the field of women's clothing, and launched Bershka in 1998. This new brand provides very cheap but absolutely fashionable clothing to young women aged 14-24. In 1999, the company acquired Stradivarius, which further strengthened its response to the needs of young ladies. In 2001, Ortega acquired the Oysho brand, which mainly deals in underwear, cosmetics, accessories and sports goods.These five brands are all operated independently, with their own independent retail stores, procurement channels, warehousing and distribution systems, subcontracting and organizational structures.

How to integrate these brands? Ortega has never forgotten the truth of letting the market speak. He knows that what he wants to sell is fashion that makes people feel fashionable and affordable, so he chooses a fashion that is completely different from ordinary clothing companies. strategy.These brands of his only share some common things in terms of legal, financial, etc., but they all adhere to the purpose of "providing fashion at an affordable price" proposed by Ortega, emphasizing excellent quality, and in purchasing, production and Distribution and other aspects adopt a similar management model, emphasizing the important role of retail stores in the entire production and sales process, so as to respond to market demand at the fastest speed.

Ortega, who accidentally embarked on the road of ready-to-wear chain sales, has found a growth path that many chain retailers have not found: providing fashionable clothes, keeping prices low, and having production and sales in between that others cannot match. design speed.As Diaz, a senior marketing staff member of Inditex, emphasized in 2001: "For us, five fingers are often used to touch the production situation of the factory, while at the same time, the other five fingers are sensing the needs of consumers."

Every Inditex garment a consumer puts on her body—whether it’s plush or woolen—willingly provides Ortega with a fortune.

Fashion process 10 times faster than others
Ortega's success is due to the fact that he allowed the Inditex Group to establish a system that can respond to consumers' tastes in a timely manner.

Zara accounts for more than [-]% of the sales of Inditex Group.As the flagship store of the group, its business strategy is quite different from that of large clothing retailers such as Benetton in Italy, Gap in the United States and H&M in Sweden.It is not limited to the fashion trends of each season, but keeps an eye on the latest fashion styles and provides products that can meet customer needs as soon as possible.Usually, when fashion magazines are still previewing the fashion trends of the season, Zara's windows are already showing these products.

Analysts from the international fashion industry and financial investment institutions spoke highly of Inditex Group's operating performance.Its fashion philosophy is: creativity, high-quality design and quick response to market demands. Inditex's staff around the world will report popular information in different markets every day, and designers in Spain will keep an eye on relevant materials and the group's daily sales, adjust existing designs, and plan new clothing series.At Zara alone, Ortega employs 200 designers.Based on the inspiration they obtained from fashion shows in Milan and Paris, they create a large number of creations, so that the company's fashion production can be more in style and less in quantity. Zara launches more than 2 fashion styles every year, which is quite an astonishing figure in the industry.

Zara's production process often starts from the store. All its chain stores are equipped with portable special equipment. The store manager enters the required samples and orders into the computer according to the sales situation of the day, wirelessly sends them to the Internet, and finally delivers them to Zara. Zara headquarters in La Coruña, northwestern Spain.

And in a bright, spacious room at Zara's headquarters, 200 designers and production managers are deciding what clothes to make.Every day, they collect suggestions from more than [-] store managers from all over the world, not only orders, but also ideas on cutting and clothing fabrics.

After evaluating the ideas of the store managers, the group decides what to produce.Designers sketch out their latest ideas on computers, which are then sent via a local area network to several nearby factories.In a few days, cut, dyed, sewn, and in as little as three weeks, the clothes will be hanging in stores in Barcelona, ​​Berlin, Beirut and more. Zara is not just a little faster than its competitors. For example, Gap’s order-to-delivery time is 9 months, while Zara only needs more than 10 days, which is nearly 20 times faster than Gap’s.

What makes Zara different is the overall sales industry network it has established. It is connected to retail stores, design studios, and internal factories. It has established a nearly perfect real-time response system in the fashion industry. Its incredible and flexible factories Being able to re-produce or re-style a pair of jeans is almost as fast as today's teenagers suddenly change their minds.It is said that it only takes two weeks for a Zara shirt to be designed from the design studio in La Coruña to the store in New York or Tokyo, and Zara will use this short period of time to conduct market research. to find the best sellers from a variety of different clothing styles.In this way, the company can quickly stop the production of slow-moving fashion.

Zara firmly believes that its business model can only be realized logically if it has the most responsive supply chain in the world. Half of the clothing Zara sells is made in its own factories, which is superior to contract manufacturers who actually make other retailers' branded clothes. Zara has a twice-weekly delivery plan, not only for replenishment, but also for newly designed clothing.To ensure efficient distribution capabilities, Zara's prolific design department designs more than 1 styles of clothing each year, far exceeding what competitors do. The advantage of Zara's unparalleled market response time far offsets the 15%-20% higher production cost than competitors.Responding so quickly to customer preferences, Zara rarely needs to have large inventory write-offs to correct sales planning mistakes, and the company also has a stable 10% profit margin, which is the best in the industry.

(End of this chapter)