PURPOSE
This blog explores the purpose of fashion and cosmetics, where the values and beliefs of different brands correlate with who their consumers are. For a brand to be successful, they need to ‘tune into all of the frequencies’ of the generation they are targeting (Witt and Baird, 2018 pg 65). Simply narrowing the demographic down to individual stereotypes minimises how many consumers they attract. This highlights how important a company’s purpose is as it defines who they sell to, therefore defining their future success and longevity.
Brand philosophy is defined as the ‘… core values, mission and vision statement of the brand, which serve as a promise and set the brand apart from others.’ (Mogaji, 2021). Not only does the brand philosophy have to appeal to the population, but it must be accurate; its external views must match with the internal running of the brand. For example, many cosmetic brands serve worldwide. Benefit Cosmetics are sold all over the world, in particular, China. Introduced in 2012, regulations were enforced whereby all cosmetics sold in China had to be tested on animals (Ethical elephant, 2023). This meant a handful of mainstream brands, including Benefit, were no longer cruelty free, due to the obligation to abide by the Chinese law (Mone,2014 in Cahill, 2018 pg 14) (Rose, 2021). This meant that the popular brand was lacking in corporate social responsibility (where a brand is aware of and publicises how they are affecting the world environmentally (Londrigan and Jenkins, 2018, pg 41-60)). This summarises the importance of brand philosophy as many customers may have been deterred from buying from the cosmetics brand when the Chinese regulations came alight. Deterring customers means a brand is in turn minimising their economic turn over.
If a company faces this, they need to communicate their purpose to Gen Z extremely well. Because Gen Z are technologically orientated, surrounded social media and an online presence, it’s important that brands explain their purpose where the generation will see it: online. ASOS’s website has a very clear section called ‘Our purpose and values’ where any online shopper can clearly see the company’s ethos’s and motives (ASOS, 2023). This establishes to consumers whether they are shopping from a brand that is aligned with their own morals.