Special tags, no discounts: Victoria's Secret keeps runway pieces out of promotions
After the show, Bank of America analysts toured a Los Angeles store. Their finding: the runway collection often sells out – and is excluded from promotions.
Symbolic image · Photo: WestportWiki / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped and resized)
Victoria's Secret wants its Fashion Show to be felt more strongly in stores, and is holding back on discounts for runway pieces. That is according to a Bank of America note dated 20 October, reported by US financial site TheStreet. Analyst Mary Sport toured a Los Angeles store after the 18 October show. There, runway items carried special tags and had dedicated styling displays, and the tagged pieces were excluded from promotions.
According to the note, stores saw more foot traffic before the show and Fashion Show merchandise frequently sold out. Sport called this "an example of how the company continues to pull back on promos." Chief executive Hillary Super had said in September: "We have made a deliberate decision to reduce our reliance on promotion and increase regular price selling." The analysts also noted sleepwear gift sets displayed at the front of the store. The company aims to have half of its global store fleet remodelled by the end of fiscal 2027.
Growth is coming from several areas, TheStreet writes: beauty has grown for twelve consecutive quarters, and sleepwear rose at a mid-teens rate. Collaborations with LoveShackFancy and K-pop group TWICE are meant to attract younger customers. Second-quarter net sales rose 10 per cent to 1.611 billion dollars. For the third quarter, the company expects net sales of 1.57 to 1.60 billion dollars and operating income of 10 to 20 million dollars.