رویکرد اقتضائی برای استراتژی SC در صنعت لوکس ایتالیایی : آیا مدل های تثبیت شده مناسب هستند ؟

The industry of luxury goods is worth investigating from the point of view of operations and supply chain (SC) strategy. Several authors expressed the need to focus SC strategy and align it towards the critical success factors (CSF) of the product/market. Despite this is a relevant topic also for the luxury industry, very few specific contributions dealing with luxury have been proposed in the SCM related literature. The present paper, based on 13 case studies of luxury manufacturers in Italy, moves its steps from the contingency theory and reports a review of the main models for SCM strategy, in order to assess their suitability to the luxury industry and to its contingent variables, in terms of CSF. Results show that most models do not apply to the luxury context; but some relevant variables can be extracted and used to identify and classify firms in this industry and to explain SC and operations strategies. It is confirmed that specific features of luxury SCs need to be taken into account.

The industry of luxury goods has become in 2006 a $170 billion business worldwide (Egon Zhender International, April 2006), with sales growing by 6% per year (Kwak and Yoffie, 2001). Despite the adverse economic cycle of the last few years, luxury goods experienced increasing demand: this is due in part to the increasing social relevance of owning luxury goods, in part to the strong commitment of the luxury companies in branding and communication management (Castaldo and Botti, 1999). Furthermore, markets are polarizing, with growth concentrated both at the lower-priced and at the high-end, especially considering fashion-sensitive businesses; as a consequence, entering the luxury market is a very attractive way to expand a brand and build a sustainable business for the future (Danziger, 2005). Does such success within this market rely on marketing initiatives only? According to Nueno and Quelch (1998) design and communication management is only one of the elements which contribute to the success of a luxury firm, together with product line management, customer service management and channel management. In other words—as assessed by Brun et al. (2008)—the whole supply chain (SC) seems to be relevant for success in the luxury industry. Despite the acknowledgment of such relevance, very few contributions dealing with the luxury industry have been proposed in the SCM related literature. The “one size fits all” approach does not hold (Childerhouse and Towill, 2000): it is necessary to explore the business field and identify the contingent aspects that set the requirements for choosing the right SC strategy, according to the competitive priorities of the luxury industry. A wide research program is ongoing at Politecnico di Milano, dealing specifically with SC and operations strategy in the luxury industry; this paper provides some interesting findings, evolving from the first publications of the research group (Brun et al., 2006, 2008; Castelli, 2006; Caniato et al., 2007). In particular, the present paper moves its steps from the contingency theory, identifies the critical success factors (CSF) for competing in the luxury market and reports a review of the main contributions in terms of SC strategy models: the latter are analyzed and compared to the data collected by the authors by means of case studies in 13 Italian luxury firms, in order to assess the suitability of each model and its capability to identify the luxury segment or classify luxury products in different categories.

The consolidated SC strategy models found in the literature have been compared with the reality of luxury firms from various industrial sectors: not all the contingent variables extracted from the models proved to be applicable to companies operating in the luxury segment. Despite some of the considered models offer useful contingent variables for identifying and classifying luxury products (uniqueness, high variety, low volumes; see Table 9), in the opinion of the authors this is not yet enough in order to provide a complete description of the segment and of its requirements in terms of SC strategy, for many of the luxury specific CSF have not been addressed by SC strategy research. Especially as regards CSF, the peculiarity of the luxury market claims for fostering alignment of the whole SC not just towards costs and speed performances but most of all towards these specific objectives. In other words, the CSF registered for the end customer should be taken into account to the extent of impacting every step of the SC. And, despite the applicability of some classification variables, not much support can be found on the SC strategy matching side: this suggests the necessity of proposing a specific SC strategy model to fit the luxury industry. Moreover, the analyzed models only provide general suggestions, which—due to high level model formulation—are not detailed into operational practices (e.g. how to identify and protect unique resources along the SC): this issue should be addressed by future research, involving companies from the luxury industry in order to identify requirements, KPI and practices both at strategic and tactical level along the various steps of the SC. We can conclude that the present paper provides a contribution to research in this field, by not only showing the limits of consolidated models when they are applied to the luxury segment, but also providing directions for further development. Indeed, the identification of the relevant variable, the SC strategy implications and the identification of the CSF that should be taken into account, set the ground for further theory development. As far as managers are concerned, we hope that such results help in highlighting the critical role of SC management for luxury firms, providing insights on both the relevant variables to be considered and the relationship between CSF and SC strategy. Some limitations of current SC strategies and practices also emerged, which need to be addressed by managers to improve the performance of their firms. The natural development and the final objective of the overall research consists in the formulation of a SCM strategy model that can provide support for defining the suitable SC configuration and practices aligned with the specific competitive priorities of the luxury industry. In this direction, the next step of the research presented in this paper will be that of assessing the explicit relationship between each luxury specific CSF and the corresponding practices to be implemented in the various stages of the SC.