Moncler and Stone Island: A merging of two distinct outerwear visions

At the end of 2020, Moncler announced their acquisition of outerwear brand Stone Island. This merger is significant in the luxury outerwear sector, where few brands have developed the loyal following and cool-factor across global markets as Stone Island. While Moncler has maintained a unique place in the industry by making space for both high-end fashion and elite activewear in their brand ethos. The remarkably high price tag does a lot of the work, keeping the Moncler brand well apart from competitors like Boegner and Mackage.

Stone Island

There are mutual benefits to the brands’ connected fates which include access to each other’s audience and markets, and the infrastructure where each has its own strengths:

“With Stone Island, Moncler is diversifying with a more technical brand after a streak of double-digit sales growth ended…Moncler may be able to help Stone Island improve its distribution. The acquirer gets 77% of its revenue through its own network of 218 stores, while Stone Island only has 24 shops and gets three-quarters of sales from wholesale partners.” (Bloomberg)

The two brands have unique histories. This makes them distinct from each other, and also is a strong case for their respective brand equity. Moncler, founded as a skiwear brand in 1952, is best known for quilted jackets and heritage as a supplier for alpine expeditions throughout the ‘50s and ‘60s.

In the ’80s, Moncler made a push towards an urban clientele that would eventually shift the brand away from its sporting goods origins to a high-fashion brand. The timing of Moncler’s streetwear strategy coincides with the launch of Stone Island. Although their audiences were always different, both brands seem to have been responding to a similar cultural moment.

“Men’s wear brand Stone Island was established in 1982, and it is known for its extensive research on fibers and textiles, experimenting with dyes and treatments.” (WWD)

Both brands push the boundaries of the outerwear category. Some of the most interesting work that comes from Stone Island has to do with the company’s technical experimentation. While for Moncler, it is the genius collection that most captures the imagination, references new ways of thinking, and develops the medium of outerwear.

Moncler Genius, Pierpaolo Piccioli

What Moncler did, through this acquisition, is re-position itself from being a target for acquisition to the master of its own fate. Elite in its own way, Stone Island, under the ownership of Moncler, actually seems to bring some agility and freshness to the older brand which otherwise might have become folded into a stifling luxury conglomerate.

Hopefully, the spirit of exploration that launched them is what carries these two brands together into the coming decades.

FAAR Chicago: Full Video

For any Chicagoans who missed our July 20 event, or anyone else curious about what we talked about: enjoy!

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

Envisioning New Realities: The intersection of fashion and aerospace

It's a wrap!

Scott Carpenter Walking to Mercury Atlas 7 launch, 1962

Thanks to everyone who came out to hear the presentation and panel discussion and ask your great questions. It was a thrilling evening, with new ideas and wild examples coming from all directions. ( Read about it here.) Looking forward to the upcoming events, that promise to expand on this discussion through different lenses of professional and personal experience. Each city has a unique culture, and heritage, and our goal is to reflect that through the panel members and the conversation.
Up next: Boston!

Save the date: November 2, 2017 at the Boston Design Center.
Until then, keep exploring!

Fashion & Aerospace Round Table

 

 

connect the dots between technologies & mindsets currently being developed in both fashion & aerospace

Due to the format, this event will be invitation only. There will be a follow up event for general interest that will involve a Q&A with leaders of this converging space. If that's you: Please also register below to get a priority invitation to the upcoming Q&A

Taking the Fashion-Tech Long View

Galileo showed the Doge of Venice how to use the telescope (Fresco by Giuseppe Bertini)

Talking fashion technology has become a largely consumer oriented dialogue. Wearables, customer experience, personalization, are all buzzwords that come up across topics and up and down market. Fashion and Tech (from both sides) are wrapped up in being of-the-moment, which takes away from the efforts put towards long-term change and realignment. So many of the more deep-rooted operational issues remain un-discussed and unchanged while we endlessly discuss the newest round of wearable devices that will be abandoned in turn.

Deep change takes more capital risk, and more bottom-up operational auditing. But when presented with an opportunity like this moment of flux in the fashion industry, those are the changes that reap the most benefit. We should all take the long-view. 

So many of the press-oriented conversation pieces begin to feel like anecdotes for brands to become part of the discussion and to say they were among the first. The short-term gains experienced by certain brands are becoming too common for any brand to really stand out, but others are still wanting to participate for fear of being left behind. With all the transient and already outdated efforts we’ve seen in Fashion & Tech, it is that much more exciting when an idea or a project truly bringing us forward.

A couple of these bright moments occurred at the recent Decoded Fashion Summit in New York City, attended by an ever growing mix of fashion, business, and tech decision makers and innovators.

In a “fireside chat” with Symphony Commerce, a service for outsourcing certain infrastructure needs to get companies through their growing pains, the conversation shifted from product to back end. How can scaling business in fashion and retail make the leap in revenue growth without equally increasing their overhead? What does it look like when a five-person startup has the efficiency of a Yoox or an Amazon? These are the questions that lead to growth in an industry that needs to learn new ways of scaling while remaining agile.

Some examples of rock stars in the fashion and tech space growing their operations by scaling out their user experience are Rent the Runway and Rebecca Minkoff. Rent the Runway launched their subscription service which founder Jennifer Hoffman sees as her dream closet, constantly rotating. “Imagine there is a trap door in the back of your closet,” she suggested. “And it leads directly into the Rent The Runway warehouse.” The RTR philosophy of smarter consumption is also one of their great assets. It provides a compass for their business growth, and gives their customers a conscious alternative to fast fashion.

Image from the WSJ 

Rebecca Minkoff’s new retail location might be brick and mortar, but there is so much embedded tech that the segue from online to off becomes seamless, to their benefit and the customer’s. They have the advantage of having participated, with great foresight, in the Fashion & Tech dialogue from the beginning, giving them the knowledge and the access to partnerships that made the dream of this store to a reality. Uri Minkoff, CEO, spoke passionately about the choices they made in building their brand’s retail embodiment. They key moments they looked at started with the moment of entry, through to discovery, the approach and interaction with the stylist, lighting, fitting rooms, the checkout, and even getting into post-visit follow up.

When we think of fashion, we obviously think of product. These examples speak to the fact that technology can really enable us to reimagine not only our products and our sales strategies but also our systems. As brands and business we should be thinking about infrastructure and logistics, becoming better and more efficient within our own walls. This will inevitably align with an improved experience for our customers. And this is a place where technology can certainly enable change within fashion companies, most notably amongst startups who are still nimble and who rely more on experimentation than big data to inform their decisions. 

While certain tech tools, including the media buzz generated by being aligned with tech, are enabling companies to make short-term gains, it is the companies that are looking at the long view who will get the most out of this mergence of Fashion and technology.