Gap Inc. Company: Marketing Essay Example

Overview of the Products and Services

Gap Inc. Company is a fashion retail firm which deals with individual care products, apparels, and accessories. The target population is men and women as well as children. The company also sells the brands made by the third party under intermix brands in its online and physical stores operating in the UK, U.S., France, Japan, Italy, Asia, and Africa. The fashion brands are affixed in real American dressing styles such as wardrobe collections including tees, denim, khakis and button-downs (Gap Inc., 2017). Denim brand is a conglomeration of the customer feedback and suggestions. The brands assume the Gap name such as GapKids, GapMaternity, BabyGap, GapFit and Gapbody (Osmanai, 2017). Gap Inc. also offers Omni services which entail reserve-in-store, order-in-store, ship-from-store and find-in-store. Most of these services are offered in online stores, franchise stores and specialty stores. More so, under Gap the company designs and avails its brand at the Gap outlets, official Gap website and factory stores.

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Apart from the Gap products, banana republic is another fashion brand affiliated with Gap Inc. The banana republic brands include versatile and contemporary classics products. On the other hand, athlete brands are designed to meet the needs of the customer's lifestyle and fitness activities. The Athleta brand incorporates technical and modified design features for Yoga, motion, sports and training. Under intermix brand, the Gap Inc. customizes the product designs to meet the personal tastes and preferences of customers as well as aim at expanding their shopping experience. The weeding way online platform allows customers to do shopping for wedding products such as wedding dresses, rings and other gifts. Gap Inc. Use multivariate positioning strategy to exploit its target market (Osmanay, 2017). For example, its target markets are strategically highly density geographical regions seeking to serve both male and female fashion needs. Through the sale of the quality brand, Gap Inc. can maintain customer loyalty and high revenues.

Customer Profile

Old Navy and banana republic are the most sold Gap Inc. products. The geographic segmentation involves dividing the market into region and density. In context, the old Navy product is sold mostly in North America and Asia specifically in urban areas. According to the Gap Inc. Report of 2017 on comparable brand sales, Old Navy Global, had a 9% increase in sales compared to 2016 5% increase in sales (Gap Inc, 2017). However, the banana republic recorded a 1% decrease in sales even though it is categorized among the popular brand sales. The urban regions of North America and Asia are densely populated thus, provide the necessary demand and market for the Navy brands. North America has over 1074 stores while the Asian region has 14stores (Gap Inc., 2017). The demographics on the sale of Old Navy brand include the highest sales in the ages between 3-40 years old for both male and women.

Regarding the life-cycle stage, Old Navy brand is sold to individuals at the bachelor status, Full Nest1 and newly married couples. Old Navy is also sold to employed and unemployed populations as long as they can afford to purchase at the set price. The sale of Old Navy also bases on the consumer behavior in the respective market segment. According to the 2016 report, most of the Old Navy sales involved customers with highest and lowest degree of loyalty (Gap Inc., 2016). In this case, the consumers were the hardcore loyal, switchers and soft-core loyal customers who made the purchase decision based on their self-expression and personality. Most of the customers were easy going, potential and non-users. The psychographic market segmentation defines the customers' social class and lifestyle. According to Gap Inc. 2016 report, the Old Navy brand was sold to both middle and working class living as succeeders, reformers and explorers (Gap Inc., 2016). The banana republic brand, on the other hand, is mostly sold in North America, Europe and Asia (Gap Inc., 2016). There are over 572 store and 45 stores in North America and Asia respectively. The target consumers are male and female aged 18-40 who are bachelors, newly married couples, employed or full nest. Similarly to the sale of Navy, consumers are easy goers, non-users and potential users. Regarding their psychographic characteristics, most of the customers are middle class and working class people living Aspirer, explorer and succeeder lifestyle.

Marketing Mix

Product

Gap Inc. marketing mix comprises of place, product, process, promotion, physical evidence and people. The impact of Gap Inc. banana republic and the old Navy brands on the design and market positioning. For instance, the brands are positioned in target market segments as trendy and cool varying in size, design and color. Gap Inc. has managed to invent new technical apparel such as the stain-resistant and heat-management cloths such as denim product sold under the Old Navy brand (Gap Inc., 2016). Additionally, under the banana republic and the old navy brands, customers can get male and female wearable such as jeans, pants, skirts, shorts, trousers as well as accessories such as bags, belts, socks and shoes.

Place

Gap Inc. integrates both offline and online sales with over 3,721stores franchise. Most of these retail shops are open from Monday to Monday giving the customers an opportunity to access the stores that are within their vicinity listed on the Gap official website. According to Art Peck, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Gap Inc., the company decided to dispose of its merchandise to increase online sales experience. Besides Gap Inc. is expanding its online presence and activities; the company allows its customers to make multiple brand purchases such as banana republic and old navy brands using a single card on a similar website. The old navy and banana republic brand are present in Canada, Japan, France, US and the UK with numerous shopping centres (Gap Inc., 2017).

Price

Gap Inc. sets its price using product line and psychological pricing approaches. For instance, the company adopted a cloud-centered optimization structure that links the inventory with respective Gap retail stores. Under this cloud system, Gap Inc. can optimize its price for Old Navy and banana republic brand by spotting the nearest distribution points to stores minimizing the distribution costs (Gap Inc., 2015).

Promotion

Gap uses both social media, print and television promotion strategy. Gap also actively uses billboards, Gap Credit Card and Product RED to increase the popularity of its brand as well as its brands' sales. For instance, the campaign for Product RED was meant to increase sensitization on the fight against AIDS in Africa as well as increase the brand value (Osmanay, 2017). The campaign was in partnership with the Converse Product Red, American Express and Giorgio Armani. Therefore, through creative product campaigns and Corporate Social Responsibility, Gap Inc. can increase its product sales.

People

According to the 2017 Gap report the company had a total of 135,000 employees working on both part-time and full-time basis. Gap emphasizes on high employee retention and hires seasonal workers during high peaks.

Physical Evidence

The gap is headquarters is strategically located in California, USA. It operates as an apparel retail industry.

Competition

The banana republic and old navy brands face stiff competition from other fashion brands on the global platform. The primary competitors include American Eagle Outfitters INC. Macy's and Urban Outfitters according to the Gap Inc. report of 2015 (AEO, 2015). The primary competitor brand to banana republic and Old Navy brands is the Aerie from the American Eagle Outfitters. Aerie is a unique product that offers a range of products such as bras, swimming costumes, and undies (Osmanay, 2017). Aerie operates over 102 stores as well as has a strong online physical presence. To overcome competition from strong competitor brands such as Aerie, Gap focuses on highly skilled employee retention as well as executives who actively engage in product development to give a quality design. Gap has also adopted multivariate distribution channels to increase brand recognition. The use of e-commerce strategies and multichannel approach enables Gap to develop customer style and value-driven products under the banana republic and the old navy brands (Omanay, 2017). The banana republic and the Old Navy work hand-in-hand to produce women fashion accessories to compete with the Aerie brand effectively. The company also maintains an active corporate social responsibility to overcome market brand competitors.

International Market

The global fashion retail industry is highly competitive since most companies are emphasizing increasing their brand value through social media marketing. Old Navy brand initially utilized the traditional marketing media such as TV and print media has changed its strategy for digital marketing to increase its competitiveness on a global platform. Through the digital strategy, Gap Inc. is establishing a strong global brand identity. The Gap Inc. Company has also expanded its investment in online platform and e-commerce increasing its capability in providing Omni-services to global customers such as cross-brand purchases and pick-up in store services after making online purchases (Gap Inc., 2017). Gap has also embraced artificial intelligence, and comprehensive customer database management is increasing its capacity in managing large consumer database and identifying gaps in the global retail industry and capitalizing on them as profitable opportunities.

According to the 2017 Gap Inc. Report, the company anticipates to increase its online presence and stores 70% as a way of strengthening its real estate portfolio. The company also is actively streamlining its operations with an anticipated expenditure of $500 million to ensure its global productivity scale leads to high profits and efficiency (Gap Inc., 2015). For example, Gap. Inc. managed to open new global stores in the Asian region in 2010. The four stores were located at Beijing and Shanghai with a corresponding Chinese website www.gap.cn. The new shops serve the Chinese customer needs in 330 cities. Besides, opening up new stores, Gap also partners with international leaders in retail fashion to provide technical support. Partnerships are also a way of outsourcing that allows GAP to minimize its advertising costs. For instance, Gap Inc. was able to collaborate with Chinese leading e-commerce retailer, Taobao to expand its brand awareness (Gap Inc., 2017). The target of this partnership was to increase the number of registered global customers by 370 million (Gap Inc., 2017). Therefore, through social media marketing, e-commerce and collaboration, Gap has been able to compete globally since most of its brands are available in over 90 countries.

References

AEO. (2015). "American Eagle Outfitters Inc." AEO Stock Quote. N.p., 2015. Web.12 Aug 2018. Retrieved from http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/aeo

Gap Inc. (2015). "GPS Analyst Estimates. N.p., 2015. Web. 12 Aug 2018. Retrieved fromhttp://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/gps/analystestimates

Gap Inc. ( 2015). Global sustainability report 2015-2017. Retrieved from http://www.gapincsustainability.com/

Gap Inc. (2017). Gap Inc. Reports fourth quarter and fiscal year 2017 results. Retrieved from http://www.gapinc.com/content/gapinc/html/media/pressrelease/2018/med_pr_030118_GPS_Q4_earnings.html

Gap Inc. (2016). 2016 Annual report. Retrieved from www.gapinc.com/content/dam/gapincsite/.../GPS%202015%20Annual%20Report.pdf

Osmanay, A. (2017). Gap Inc.: Marketing strategy analysis of the company. Retrieved from https:...