Zara

1. Store managers more authority on deciding which garment to be put on sale.

2. Commercials decide which garments to be produced and sold.
3. As Zara is vertically integrated lead times, as well as time for new product launches, is less(2-
4 weeks), while the average is 6 months.
4. IT spending:- 0.5% of revenue as in-house applications were developed
Marketing:-

1. Low spending on marketing, heavy spending on sales

2. No ‘classics’ clothes but clothes with very short lifespan forcing customers to buy it on the
spot, visit stores often

Ordering:-

1. Manual inventory management based upon direct observation & store manager judgment
2. Use of PDA’s, Infrared, dial-up modem for order management
3. The process is complicated & divided in various steps such as breaking order into segments
and beaming these segments to concerned person who then filled up their part.

Design and manufacturing:

5. Maximum time from conception to distribution center is three weeks

6. Vertically integrated supply chain ensured the constant introduction of new items with short
lead times
7. Based upon commercial’s guess which need not be accurate.
8. Average new launches per year:11000
Information systems at La Coruna, factories, stores & DC’s

1. Factories had simple applications which provided information about order & due dates.
2. Distribution center had largest automation with complete tracking of SKU’s.
3. Stores used PDA’s which communicate to La Coruna via modems. PDA’s were upgraded
constantly while POS terminals remained same for over decade! POS used DOS as operating
system & its installation & maintenance was very simple. No real-time feedback from stores
to Zara’s headquarters. Transmission required copying into floppy disc & then sending it
using internet which happened at the end of the day. No dialogue between PDA & POS
inside store or between two stores
Problem:-
1. This system does all the basic operations of billing but doesn’t provide any customer
insights, real-time data or any advanced sales projections.
2. Hardware vendor may modify peripherals for POS so that they may not run on ancient OS
such as DOS.
3. No separate IT department, all decisions related to IT applications taken directly by top
management.
4. Ample room for growth exists within Zara’s current markets: - Centralized data to help
expand in different countries. Increase in number of stores implies increase in Data-Base size
& need for real time database

Index:-
1. In index, first column can be used to represent
=INDEX(IF(MATCH(J46,L35:L37,0)=1,customer_type_10,IF(MATCH(J46,L35:L37,0)=2,B44:F48,B52:F56
)),MATCH(J44,J34:J38,0),MATCH(J42,H34:H38,0))
=INDEX(IF(MATCH(J46,L35:L37)=1,customer_type_10,IF(MATCH(J46,L35:L37=2),B44:F48,B52:F56)),
MATCH(J44,J34:J38),MATCH(J42,H34:H38))