Retail Marketing - Shopping Center Marketing

There’s an interesting article in today’s Boston Globe about the impending demise of Jasmine Sola, a trendy, upscale women’s clothier that had until recently been on a meteoric rise. The story details how Jasmine Sola went from a carefully-curated boutique in Cambridge, Massachusetts to a booming regional chain known for its colorful stores and high-end (yet young-skewing) merchandise before being sold to New York and Company, who in only two years managed to overexpand and destroy the chain’s merchandise mix. The way they neglected to cater their merchandise mix to individual markets is also somewhat reminiscent to many of the complaints about the national strategy employed by Macy’s:

“Manganella, an Italian immigrant who started Jasmine in 1970 with a $2,500 loan from his mother, had relied on instinct, not science or financial spreadsheets. He learned about women’s clothing from his mother and sister, both seamstresses, and developed a keen sense of style. At Jasmine, named after the flower, he had given space to unknown designers, which made his boutique a fashion icon for teens and twentysomethings…

[Full Story by Caldor at Labelscar]