For a growing urban population, an efficient transit system is needed to move people around. A single track is useful in the very early stages, but eventually this hits a ceiling. Over time, multiple tracks are needed to shuttle people around quickly.
For apparel brands, product creation needs a similar approach. Here’s why. If we stripped away the specifics of a product creation calendar, a straight line between concept to market remains. All products, regardless of complexity, travel on the same path. This is shown in Figure 1.
Related Stories
Figure 1. All products are created equally using the same path, regardless of the complexity of the product.
The hidden assumption is that all products are equal, so they are created equally.
But this is clearly not the case.
Customers see a different look, feel, color, drape and other characteristics of an apparel product. On the back end: the materials, supply chains, testing requirements and seasonality of the product also differ. Therefore, forcing all products through a single-track calendar makes no sense. So, let’s define the phrase Acceptable Inequality: Not all products are equal, therefore not all products should be created equally.
With this in mind, brands should invest in process innovation to evolve single-track calendars into multi-track ones. The intention of the multi-track is to remove the inherent misalignment of a product and its value chain from the traditional product creation calendar.
Briefly, here’s the value of making the move. A single-track calendar creates two problems. Downstream, late launches miss peak consumer interest, hurting full-price sell-through and piling up excess inventory. Upstream, it places extra burden at mills and factories. Late changes after proto review or post–assortment lock (because of a market signal or someone just changed their mind) triggers rework. This includes new development requests, updated tech packs and BOMs, fresh patterns and prototypes. The domino effect pushes deliveries out, forces expensive air freight, and overloads suppliers.
Process innovation of this type fits squarely into fashion’s “First Mile Opportunity” as described by John Thorbeck in his “Under the Banyan Tree” and other related work. If done correctly, this is precisely where margins rise, working capital is unlocked and where we get control over the problem of overdevelopment.
Building the Tracks
From our perspective, there are five commonly used tracks to accommodate different types of products.
Seasonless Track: Reserved for core and basic products.
Seasonal Fashion Track: This is the main, foundational track for the season.
Capsule Tracks: Used for special collaborations or regionally specific assortments.
Fast-Track: Used to capitalize on emerging trends or for rapid replenishment of best
sellers.
Innovation Tracks: Reserved for the development of the most unique, never before seen
products. In theory, this track exists in perpetuity.
We can map these tracks against the concept to market pathway as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Seasonless, seasonal, capsule, fast-track and innovation tracks on the concept to market timeline. Tracks are shown arbitrarily with different start points but the same end points.
Not every brand will need to make use of each track. Some will use less and others may use more.
Consider this example: A global performance brand runs multiple tracks, each with a purpose: a foundational main track, channel-specific tracks for DTC, exclusives for key accounts, and a bags/backpacks track timed to moments like back-to-school.
Also, fashion brands can take the fast-track concept to a more granular level with “read and react,” “express” and “testing” tracks.
How does each track account for product inequality? Beyond seasonal material strategy (which we have discussed previously in an SJ article), tracks are created based on product type, seasonality (seasonless, core, seasonal), and design/development complexity. Then, tracks can be further distinguished by the extent of digital product creation. For example, keep seasonless items strictly digital since they recur every season, reserving physical sampling/prototyping for the innovation track with more rigorous testing needs. Capsules are smaller than main seasons, need fewer touchpoints, and can start later. Fast-track capsules triggered by market signals launch closer to market on a shorter timeline and tactics like postponement can be applied here.
Collapsing Silos
Establishing the multi-track calendar is a collaborative process. Inputs from planning, merchandising, design/development, material planning, and sourcing/production are required. Therefore, the siloed nature of retail, not a lack of skills or resources, will prove to be the most significant barrier that hinders progress. In our opinion, a leadership figure must unify these functions around common goals to establish collaborative behavior. This approach seems to be an emerging theme in organizations, not just in fashion, to bring together normally disparate functions to kickstart innovation efforts.
Case Study
A fast-fashion brand has three distinct product tracks: Design Development, Market Buys, and Merchant Development. The variables that distinguish the three are “speed” and “uniqueness in market.” These variables are inversely proportional to each other: the more unique the item, the longer it takes to get to market. This brand funnels about 60% of all women’s apparel into the Design Development pathway, which is the most unique of the three. This pathway is reserved for collaboration collections because that is where uniqueness is required the most. Market Buys and Merchant Development paths are reserved to quickly jump on emerging or hot trends.
Conclusion
A single-track calendar for all products creates a product creation traffic jam. Since products are inherently unequal, they cannot be created equally. A multi-track calendar removes the mismatch of a product’s value chain from traditional calendars. This form of process innovation accelerates speed to market for brands while reducing the burden on suppliers. Calendar tracks are defined by traits including materials, testing needs and seasonality. Finally, when siloed functions are collapsed and unified, process innovation of this kind delivers gains that outpace anything a single-track process delivers.
Liza Amlani and Raj Dhiman, PhD are Co-founders of Retail Strategy Group. They work with market-leading brands to achieve dramatic growth and increased profitability. Amlani and Dhiman discuss multi-track processes in greater detail in their upcoming book “The Material Life – Process Innovation for Brands and Retailers” published by Routledge/Productivity Press and is available for pre-order on Nov. 26. Learn more at www.retailstrategygroup.com.
