1.1 Vintage Luxury Fashion—The Making Off
Coco Chanel once said ‘in order to be irreplaceable one must always be different’ which remains true for vintage and secondhand luxury fashion. As academics, we are continuously searching for new challenges and new topics to explore—being able to combine this with a personal passion and share this with a wider audience makes this even more special. This edited book provides an insight into the Advances of Luxury and sheds light on vintage and secondhand fashion within a global context. We would like to thank our contributors for their engaging and fascinating chapters, without whom this book would not have been possible.
1.2 Introduction
The past decades have witnessed a growing trend of secondhand fashion consumption in both Western and Eastern countries, including China, which previously had a negative connotation of buying used garments due to aspects of saving face (Cervellon et al. 2012). Amongst other environmental factors, it appears that the current economic and social climate has contributed towards a new consumer trend for acquiring and reusing secondhand clothing.
The global secondhand clothing trade—having been defined as any fashion item that has been ‘pre-loved or pre-owned’ and without age/era restrictions—has grown as an economic entity, providing a living for in excess of 100,000 people and offering a desirable and essential clothing source in underdeveloped economies (Hansen 2000; Mhango and Niehm 2005). The secondhand luxury fashion industry is comprised of sectors, which include clothing, footwear and accessories (the latter of which constitutes leather goods, such as shoes, handbags, watches and jewellery). Secondhand luxury fashion also includes vintage fashion, which is associated with garments from specific eras, namely the 1920s to the 1990s (Gerval 2008). Contrary to secondhand luxury fashion, vintage fashion does not necessarily have to be used, but can also be, for example, catwalk pieces that have never been worn or only been worn once. Gerval (2008) defines vintage as garments, which offer the consumer luxury value through product exclusivity, exceptional craftsmanship and in vintage terms, unique high-fashion pieces of a specific era. Recent years have seen an extension of this definition, to include garments produced in the period between the 1920s and 1980s, associated with aspects of nostalgia (Cervellon et al. 2012; Crewe and Martin 2016). For us, the editors, we felt there were significant opportunities and a gap to fully define, explore and examine contemporary developments within the (secondhand) vintage and luxury fashion market, focusing particularly on aspects related to product marketing, merchandising, branding and communication, within the much broader context of the fashion supply chain. These aspects are addressed within this edited book.
Vintage and secondhand luxury fashion not only provides an interesting context, but also is economically significant, with the vintage market sales figures having reached £2.8bn in 2015 (Brooks 2015). The popularity of vintage has arisen as a result of attitudinal changes in society towards wearing and buying secondhand goods, attributed to some extent by a response to the negative publicity and effects of fast fashion, but also as a result of the use of vintage inspirations by fashion designers and followers of fashion, including fashion icons and celebrities. Secondhand luxury fashion and (secondhand) vintage have emerged as ‘it’ terms and are used as stimuli to further research consumer expectations and the implications for business. The terms secondhand luxury fashion and (secondhand) vintage are related, yet distinct in their own right and can be clearly defined. Whilst secondhand luxury fashion incorporates all secondhand vintage garments/accessories, not all vintage products are necessarily secondhand. The marketplace interpretation of vintage fashion has become blurred in recent times, with some stores manufacturing newly finished garments to mimic vintage designs, thus re-naming stock ‘vintage clothing’. This coupled with overuse of the term in the media has caused some confusion in the marketplace.
1.3 Sustainable Fashion—Secondhand Luxury and Vintage Fashion
The essence of this book is embedded within the wider remit of sustainable fashion and builds on our previous work: Sustainability in Fashion—A Cradle to Upcycle Approach. The underpinning thematic, which concerns sustainability in fashion and the global perspective, offers a truly differential and unique advantage. The rise in secondhand luxury fashion and (secondhand) vintage fashion fits with the sustainability agenda of governments. The UK government launched an initiative in 2007, working together with DEFRA and WRAP (Waste and Resource Action Plan) on a Sustainable Clothing Roadmap and Action Plan. The aim was to ‘improv[e] the sustainability of clothing across its lifecycle, from the crops […] grown to make the fabrics, to the design and manufacture of the garment, retail, use and end-of-life’ (DEFRA 2011). Thus, the secondhand luxury market and the (secondhand) vintage market allow developing the end-of-life treatment further by extending the usefulness of garments. Sustainability is thus driving innovation and efficiency within many organisations and has also become an important topic on the curriculum within most leading universities.
1.4 The Content of the Global Secondhand Luxury Fashion and (Secondhand) Vintage
This book provides a compendium of contemporary secondhand luxury fashion and (secondhand) vintage business developments from across the globe, offering applications from Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Secondhand fashion retailing is not a fad that is going in and out of fashion, but rather a necessity within the industry that is continuously increasing in importance. The overall content addresses a key market challenge, by reinforcing and unfolding important management issues related to the growing secondhand luxury and vintage context. The contemporary aspects of this book will entice and educate readers by eliciting important new findings within consumption behaviour, retail marketing strategy and supply chain management, through the use of various methodological (qualitative and quantitative) designs as well as conceptual chapters, in order to better understand some of the key business issues. The scope of investigation for academics and practitioners is endless. For example, whilst previous business management research has predominantly focused on Western and Asian countries, limited textbook contributions have centred on the Middle East as a case study approach, despite evidence of the secondhand luxury consumption phenomenon. All of our contributors have been carefully chosen for their expertise in the field of secondhand luxury and vintage.
Chapters 2 and 3 are both conceptual contributions kick starting off the book in well-rounded manner. Chapter 2—Restructuring Secondhand Fashion from the Consumption Perspective—written by Linda Lisa Maria Turunen, Hanna Leipämaa-Leskinen and Jenniina Sihvonen from Finland hones in on what the terms vintage and secondhand fashion entail. The contribution critically reviews current literature and provides a unique perspective both on secondhand luxury and fashion items, particularly since prior research within this remit has mainly focused on brand-new goods and on conventional shopping and retail channels.
Chapter 3—Access-Based Consumption: A New Business Model for Luxury and Secondhand Fashion Business?—moves away from terminology and provides an insight into different business models currently used to sell, rent and swap vintage and secondhand luxury fashion. Amira Battle, Daniella Ryding and Claudia E. Henninger centre their contribution around a newly emerging phenomenon in the fashion industry in that it explores business models that support the shift from owning garments to liquid consumption. This chapter provides an innovative insight into the concept of access-based consumption—the idea of temporarily being able to use and experience a good/service without making a transaction that transfers their ownership. The mini case studies provide an insight into the benefits and drawbacks of each model, whilst further highlighting some key drivers for the vintage and luxury secondhand sector.
Chapter 4—Understanding the Culture of Consuming Pre-owned Luxury—is a contribution written by Carly Fox, a fashion and lifestyle practitioner. This chapter provides an insight into the pre-loved luxury sector, which creates an interesting debate based on a practitioner experience, rather than to confirm or refute theoretical constructs. Although the concept of pre-owned luxury is discussed in diverse disciplines including historical analysis, cross-cultural comparisons, luxury as an investment, counterfeiting, there are still aspects that have been overlooked or under-researched, in particular the underlying motivations for procuring and collecting pre-owned luxury.
Moving away from the UK context, Chapter 5—Pre-loved? Analysing the Dubai Luxe Resale Market—a contribution by Liz Barnes and Gaynor Lea-Greenwood explores the notion of secondhand luxury fashion in the Middle East, more specifically Dubai. This chapter allures to the underlying secrecy with which secondhand fashion buying and selling are treated and clearly demonstrate the role of culture and its impact on the secondhand and vintage luxury industry. This chapter unravels the unique characteristics of the secondhand luxury market defined by this rapidly growing, nouveau riche region, with a focus on the challenges and opportunities for the sector. The research is underpinned by branding and international retail marketing theories, whilst at the same times explores the impact of the cultural context in which religion and saving faces play a key role.
Similarly to the previous contribution, Chapter 6—Narrative and Emotional Accounts of Secondhand Luxury Purchases Along the Customer Journey—focuses on the consumer perspective and the decision-making process. This contribution by Marie-Cécile Cervellon and Edwige Vigreux provides a critical insight into the emotional appeal of the customer journey of purchasing secondhand luxury items. The French context provides an interesting insight into the emotional appeal in the customer journey across different distribution channels (secondhand boutiques and online websites such as Vestiaire Collective and Vide Dressing).
A key question that emerges throughout the book is whether there may be a negative connotation towards secondhand luxury and vintage fashion, which is a central point in Chapter 7—Perceived Brand Image of Luxury Fashion and Vintage Fashion—An Insight into Chinese Millennials’ Attitudes and Motivations—a UK c...