CHALLENGE: To bring back a fashion clothing brand to  mainstream business

A brand XXX that was described by the CEO as “lost In  translation”, a womenswear clothing brand that was centered on  feminine Indian occasion wear and made two collections in a year  didn’t have a self identity and a target audience, it was making and  selling according to what worked best in the market and what the  retail chains would demand. The creative director depended  heavily on Pinterest for inspiration, originality was out of the  window, and so was visuals, imagery, social media, marketing, but  the good thing was a team of artisans was in place, and an  experienced(in the context of time spent working with the designer)  design team.  FACTS: The important part is that the brand XXX initially started  with a vision but the designer left the company after three years it  was started and the brand saw a dip in the market, now, the  designer is back after 2 years but lacks vision and the company is  not making any proﬁts still.  I am hired as a brand manager to solve this problem of losses and  defamation of the brand and bring it back to its good business  days.  I was brought in in a conservative, man dominated work scenario  where I was not allowed to create a team or make more than  nominal expenses.

SELECTION: The tool selected here is actually all of Design  Thinking for Innovation but I will zero in on Storytelling.  Why I selected this was I understood after meeting my employer,  the designer, and the team that they were all inexperienced except  the CEO who thought ‘one size ﬁts all’, and the fact that they were  not ready to fully accept that the company is NOT taking the right  decisions or lacks vision and innovation at that point of time, given  the fact I was hired to make proﬁt and create love for the brand in  the market.  If the brand carried on the way it did it would be a downhill which  meant more losses, so I decided its best to revive the brand’s  image and give it a new identity with in the same brand name.

I realised I have to talk them into the idea and that’s when  storytelling too came to my rescue.

Application: It was obvious that the brand lacked identity or what  does the brand stand for? Or Who the face is, what does she do,  where does she go, who are her friends, where does she live? Her  personality, needs, aspiration, inspiration, and we didn’t have a  story, a cause, a face, an audience, a muse or the TG.  So, I had to work on building a story merging all these topics  around the new woman that the brand XXX is now about. I brought them together for a meeting on a pleasant day in a place  surrounded with nature and started with appreciating the facts:  how the brand’s creative director is a woman, CEO is a woman, the  design team is all women, and the brand is for the women, so, the  brand is bigger than just clothes its about them, the designer,  myself, the team, the woman of today, the powerful women, who  are free, make their own choices, working, independent, informed,  aware, and with a purpose, so the brand found itself although a  hazy but a personality. Then I shared who represents many of these  factors, Priyanka Chopra, an ideal woman of today, who is an  international talent and UN’s global goodwill ambassador we see  her work across the globe and she works for the underprivileged in  her spare time, promotes Indian culture pan globe and is an  inspiration to many young girls and women of her generation in  India and abroad. She is a woman of colour, in India, fair women  are considered beautiful, so Priyanka ditches that myth. She  stands her truth with conﬁdence and thats the kind of women XXX  would want to dress and make clothes for. She married a younger  guy and rejected many beliefs for the best.

I pressed upon the fact how important environment is and how its  directly proportional to the choices we make everyday, and the  woman we represent embodies this truth. By using examples of  designers like Stella McCartney who banned fur and leather from  her clothing or actor Emma Watson who supports green,  sustainability and so on. I managed to bring their attention to how  packaging ultimately becomes waste and areas where we can save  the planet and simultaneously save money.

This helped them to see the bigger picture for the brand than just  think about the clothes.

I used my own life’s experiences and appreciation to the team’s  eﬀorts to invoke conﬁdence in them and to push them to do their  best.

INSIGHT: I realised how inspiring stories can be and how women  just need to know that they can do it, and the do it. Its easy to  sabotage them and make one part of the society look interesting  but really it’s time that we understand the importance of their  freedom, choices, body, and start supporting them and standing  up for them and being equal.

APPROACH: If I were to approach this situation again then I would  invite personalities to talk and interact with the brand and the team  and share their inspiring stories so they have variety and living  examples to conﬁrm their thoughts.

