The luxury fashion industry is facing increasing scrutiny due to its negative environmental impact and unsustainable production methods. However, new business models in the form of second-hand commerce and renting are emerging as attractive options for consumers, reshaping the luxury fashion landscape. This paper examines the current state of second-hand luxury fashion and explores the business models adopted by companies in this sector. A review of existing literature reveals key themes pertaining to second-hand luxury, including consumer motivations and attitudes towards recycled luxury fashion, the evolving meanings and consumer identities associated with second-hand luxury, the impact on the traditional luxury fashion industry, the environmental benefits of recycled luxury fashion, and the business models and sustainability strategies of companies operating in this sector.

The purpose of this study was to explore the importance level, the present level, and the educational need for 21 business ethics components among 2-year and 4-year college students majoring in fashion. Survey data of 364 students (128 students of 2-year colleges and 238 students of 4-year colleges) were analyzed through descriptive statistics, Borich’s needs assessment for education, The Locus for Focus model, exploratory factor analysis, and t-test. The results showed five business ethics components ranked highly as educational needs among college students: ‘reducing waste’, ‘using vegan materials’, ‘using human-friendly materials’, ‘strengthening sustainable technologies’, and ‘promoting workers’ rights’. Those components should be integrated into curricula of fashion majors in colleges. Students in 4-year colleges considered most of 21 business ethics components as more important than did students at 2-year colleges. More needs for education were observed by 4-year college students in eight business ethics components than by 2-year college students. In addition, a positive attitude toward business ethics education and the suitability of business ethics education were higher among 4-year college students than 2-year college students. Results provide a guideline for business ethics education by indicating a list of business ethics components that urgently needed to be adapted to fashion curricula according to each college type.

The purpose of the present study was to generate a list of business ethics components according to business area for small and medium-sized fashion companies. Based on the literature review, 21 components of business ethics components were identified within five business areas. Ten CEOs(Chief Executive Officers) each participated in an in-depth interview, sharing ethical and unethical cases from their own businesses. Constant comparative analysis was used to generate important business ethics components from those cases. In results, important business ethics components for each business area are: 1) using human-friendly materials, strengthening sustainable technologies, using vegan materials, concerning safe process, and reducing waste in the material production and sourcing area, 2) enhancing an efficiency in design, developing recycle/reuse designs, avoiding to copy designs, and using messages for public interest in the product design area, 3) concerning fair-trade, reducing harmful substance, saving energy, and using ethical supply channels in the distribution and logistics area, 4) acquiring certifications, promoting consumer protection, avoiding exaggerative/false advertisements, and promoting social contributions in the management and marketing area, and 5) promoting workers’ rights, complying with the law, and investing on employee educations in the labor management area. All of the ethical and unethical cases of the ten companies have involved aspects of the 21 components, thereby enhancing understandings on how each issue is being seriously considered and/or handled in the small and medium-sized fashion companies. Study findings may provide a basis for development of a research model for quantitative studies and/or educational programs related to business ethics in the fashion industry.

In recent years, maintaining transparency has become a trend among brands, and a better level of supply chain transparency has been demonstrated to positively affect consumer environmental concern and conscious behavior. Consumers may accept transparency efforts as a signal of the brand goodwill and perceive it as a visibly sustainable effort that can convert brand trust. In the information transparency trend, eco-certification plays an important role as a tool to inform consumers about sustainability. However, facing large amounts of information, consumers spend much time filtering information, so the accuracy of the obtained information can be compromised. The Higg index is a sustainable verification platform that reveals the entire activities of supply chains. However, most consumers are facing an overload of information that could confuse their processing of any information. In this context, the present study seeks to examine the effect of business transparency to conscious consumer behavior and purchase intention. Second, this study deals with the moderating effects of sustainable knowledge on the relationship between business transparency, environmental concern, and brand trust. Third, we explore the effects of high and low level of consume knowledge of sustainability on the relationship between business transparency and brand trust. In terms of the methodology used in the present study, an off-line survey of Korean consumers was conducted. SPSS 21.0 was used for data analysis aiming to test the proposed model and research hypothesis. The mains results of this study are as follows. First, business transparency has a positive effect on environmental concern, brand trust, and consumer willingness to conscious behavior. Second, consumer sustainable knowledge has a moderating effect on business transparency for environmental concern and brand trust. Taken together, the findings of the present study provide meaningful implications for marketers by highlighting the importance of transparency and introduction of a transparent eco-certification for communication with consumers. To successfully influence consumer willingness to assume conscious behavior, brands are advised to provide standardized transparency labels, rather than complicated information.

This paper investigates the adaptation of suppliers’ business models to the changing customers relationships, with a focus on the fashion industry. The analysis of business models represents an understudied topic in business to business marketing research (Ehret, Kashyap and Wirtz, 2013; La Rocca and Snehota, 2017). In this regard, the paper tries to propose an original contribution by addressing the issue of how suppliers adapt their business models to cope with the needs of their fast fashion customers. It is well known that the fast fashion formula has represented an innovative business model which has generated huge changes within the fashion industry (Barnes and Lea-Greenwood, 2006). While, the business models of global brands, such as those of Zara or H&M, have been deeply studied, minor attention has been given to the business models of the suppliers that interact with this kind of players. Consequently, the paper addresses a research gap that regards the suppliers' business model changes due to the interaction with fast fashion clients. The paper has an exploratory nature. Methodologically, it proposes two qualitative case studies of suppliers in interaction with fast fashion suppliers, pointing out the main features of the adaptation of their business models in the relationship with these clients. The paper contributes to theory and managerial practice pointing out some drivers of change for suppliers with respect to the most evident characteristics of the business model of the buyers. It describes these drivers and proposes some relevant evidences to support the study of business models in business markets.

This contribution focuses on fitting between heuristic rules and the task environment in business to business market. The subject is about evidence-based business decision-making process in the business actors‟ perspective. The empirical setting of fashion business to business markets is considered, focusing on adaptive behavior situated in the interaction processes in customer-supplier relationships emerging from empirical researches. The paper considers two key aspects of the process: (1) the origin and diffusion of the heuristic rules adopted by the actors (adoption) and (2) the fields in which the rules can be used (scope) are discussed. The central research questions are: How heuristics are adopted and diffused in the fashion business to business environment (adoption)? How wide is the context in which the heuristic rule is applied by the actors (scope)? Fashion business to business markets is our setting of analysis. First of all we have to define what are heuristics. Studies of decision-making processes generally divide them into two, mutually exclusive types: rational decision making versus rule-based decision making (March 1994). In the case of rational decision making the approach is to evaluate the consequences of any decision in terms of either pure (maximizing) or limited rationality (satisficing). In rational decision making, consequential choices are adopted, hence an evaluation of preferences and expectations is necessary and decisive to the final outcome. Instead, in rule-based decision making, what counts most is following the rules, the aim being to satisfy and/or define an identity. In rule-based decision making, rules deemed appropriate are adopted, and what then counts are the rules and the identity, which form the basis for taking well-thought-out actions. Rationality requires less „specific‟ knowledge, since it relies on abstract rules. In this approach, following the rules may instead involve understanding them in relation to the specific context in which they are to be applied. The relations between heuristics and interaction in business networks provide a means to study other aspects of the evolution of the relationship between enterprise and business market environment (Artinger et al. 2015; Guercini et al. 2014, 2015). In fact, the network of relationships the actors adopt images of the relationships to be cultivated with the precise aim of formulating an effective representation of the market, enable other phenomena to be examined, not so much in their qualitative aspects, but rather as regards their importance as perceived by business decision-makers. In light of these relations between heuristics and setting, the essential properties of heuristics that we propose to examine herein are: (1) specificity, intended as the field of application and setting in which any heuristic rule is generated and routinely applied; (2) convergence, which concerns how widespread, at least in appearance, any given heuristic rule is amongst actors in a given market setting (Guercini 2012). In other terms, the heuristics of entrepreneurial marketing can be considered specific to this particular setting, in that they concern the degrees to which such rules are generated, are successful, and are confined to the specific setting or context. Looking more closely at the two above-mentioned properties, specificity is high when, for instance, a heuristic refers to a specific, circumscribed matter (for example assessing the opportune moment to purchase certain semi-finished goods) and finds no application in any other setting. Conversely, a rule‟s degree of specificity is low when its field of application is broad: a rule may, since its inception, be applicable to many different fields, or it may be initially applicable only to a limited range of decisions, but subsequently find fruitful application in other, broader matters (Guercini et al. 2014). The degree of convergence instead regards the frequency with which a given heuristic rule is adopted within a population, a community or, in our case, by entrepreneurs. Such adoption may only be apparent, in the sense that what seems to be a single rule may actually represent various, subtly different rules for each individual, given the supremely personal, individual nature of fine mental processes. Evaluating the degree of convergence of a given heuristic within a population obviously involves measuring its dissemination in terms that are recognized as such by the researcher. Convergence is high for rules adopted by everyone, or at least by a large segment of the population in question. Other heuristic rules are instead developed by individuals in forming their personal judgments and seem to be unique to such individuals, in that they do not arise in others. This implies that heuristic rules may be the source of a relative advantage for the entrepreneur, in so far as the heuristic in question proves itself successful, that is, an element that determines a good choice when other methods are ineffective or may even produce negative effects. Specificity and convergence are thus general properties of the heuristics adopted by entrepreneurial marketers, and are strongly tied to the interpersonal relationships and consequent interactions within business decision-makers‟ personal contact networks (Guercini et al. 2015). Heuristic procedures are easily detectable in the descriptions of enterprise top management of the processes they utilize in assessing possibilities and forming judgments. Some of these procedures are highly abstract and applicable to various different settings, for instance, regarding problems typically facing firms as well as purchase decision-makers. In the following we shall briefly present some of the heuristics encountered in our research; a more detailed description and more rigorous modeling of their characteristics will be addressed in future work. Let us consider now a fashion business to business settings, and more precisely the situation in which the decision-maker of a fashion firm is tasked with formulating a judgment regarding the best choice of colors to keep up with the fashion trends of coming seasons. From interviews with representatives of styling divisions, what repeatedly emerged was their conviction that “strong” colors periodically and forcefully come back in fashion. Some even went so far as to specify the duration of this cycle: seven years – that is, the same as the number of strong colors –, which also turns out to be coherent with long-standing observations on the limits of human cognitive function (Miller 1956). No clearly defined explanation was offered of the reasons for, or origins of, this rule, although some hypotheses were advanced: simply that a sort of “law” was first noticed and then became consolidated as its predictions were repeatedly verified over time. A second example is that of the textile firm entrepreneurial marketer called on to provide a forecast of the fabrics that will be most widely utilized in the market over the next few seasons. From the marketer‟s perspective, the price of natural fibers is one element on which to base any judgment regarding future fabric usage trends. Clearly, there are technical time constraints on the purchasing of fibers for spinning, which must naturally precede the sale of the fabric, and may even take place already in the stage of drafting the fabric sample book. Thus, a specific assessment rule is applied: those fibers whose price increases during certain periods of the year are deemed to be those that will be in most widespread use the following season. However, for some years now this rule has begun to seem less reliable than in the past. Workers in the sector speak of greater complexity in the wool market, where supply factors, such as international manufacturers‟ policy of stepping up fiber tops production, have had the effect of upsetting traditional market dynamics. The heuristic rules in these examples can be regarded in the perspective of the attributes they present, in particular, their “specificity” (or field of application) and their “convergence” (or degree of dissemination). A rule that is highly specific to a certain application setting looses much of its value when applied to judgments other than the one for which it has been developed. On the other hand, a rule that is in widespread use in many firms can hardly become a distinctive resource for entrepreneurial marketers. The widespread dissemination of a given heuristic rule amongst the rules “in stock” or the “adaptive toolbox” of firms may influence its effectiveness. Indeed, the fact that a rule is shared by many may justify its adoption in light of the validity that the decision-makers seem to attribute it, even if it is less probable that its use impart a distinctive competitive advantage. The examples of heuristic processes presented in the foregoing seem to enjoy different degrees of specificity and convergence. The association of certain heuristics to specific settings takes on the significance attributed to them by Simon (1979), as rules bound by the task environment and not clearly referable to relatively abstract mechanisms or endowed with autonomy. Mechanisms applicable to less specific settings are instead referable to the heuristics described by Tversky and Kahneman (1974), including representativeness, availability and adjustment/anchoring, identified in relation to the possible distortions and errors associated to them. The heuristics modeled by “building blocks” by Gigerenzer et al. are seemingly cannot be captured by a few categories, given the variety of formal models identified. Briefly, these include (1) recognition heuristic; (2) fluency heuristic; (3) take-the-best; (4) tallying; (5) satisficing; (6) 1/N equality heuristic; (7) default heuristic; (8) tit-for-tat; (9) imitate the majority; (10) imitate the successful; (11) hiatus heuristic; (12) fast and frugal trees; (13) mapping models; (14) averaging the judgment; (15) social circle; (16) moral behavior (Gigerenzer and Gaissmaier 2011, Gigerenzer and Brighton 2009). In the approach proposed by Gigerenzer and his “adaptive behavior and cognition program”, formal models are necessary to evaluate the real contribution of heuristics to cognition, decision-making and behavior. For details, refer to the publications of the adaptive-behavior-and-cognition program (Gigerenzer 2007; Todd and Gigerenzer 2012). Rule-based decision making implies the availability of rules to follow and consistency with an established identity as the driving factors in the decisionmaking process. If the rules satisfy an ecological rationality approach, are such rules then the result of a process of rules selection with which the decision makers are endowed innately or they are formed through a process of learning? And, if the latter is true, what are the characteristics of the decision-making process during the stage that the rules formation schemes are more open? And lastly, when the rules have already been defined, are they necessarily stable or can they be questioned and, if so, in what terms? These research questions are part of the future research stimulated by this first exploration based on case study research.

Clothing longevity supports sustainability, but the paper questions the implementation of this strategy. The research, based on industry and expert experiences, posits the technical possibility of achieving longer-lasting clothing, but identifies norms of agency and interaction within the global clothing supply chain as factors limiting the business case and processes.

The objective of this study was to compare business management indicators among textiles and fashion companies. Business management indicators of 356 textiles and fashion companies for the year 2015 were analyzed, using income statements showing their management results. The results were as follows. First, there were statistically significant differences between the operating income ratios of textiles and fashion companies for the term, but there were none when it came to net income ratio. Second, the differences between cost of goods sold, cost of finished goods sold, and cost of merchandise sold to sales ratios among textiles and fashion companies were all statistically significant. The cost of goods sold, cost of finished goods sold, and cost of merchandise sold to sales ratios were higher for fiber and thread companies, fabric companies, and dyeing and finishing companies than for clothing and fashion accessories companies. Third, there were statistically significant differences between the ratio of salaries and the ratio of advertising expenses among textiles and fashion companies. The salaries ratios and advertising expenses ratios for clothing companies were higher than those of fiber and yarn companies, fabric companies, and dyeing and finishing companies. This study is meaningful as it has identified the business characteristics of textiles and fashion companies using the management indicators of those companies, which have not been sufficiently explored by previous studies. It has also helped to improve understanding of the industrial structure of the upstream and midstream sectors of the textiles and fashion industries.

The purpose of this study is to assess whether the emotional leadership of the CEO of a fashion company has a significant influence on corporate performance. In this study, a survey was conducten on employees of fashion companies from August 1 to 30, 2015, and 350 copies of questionnaires were collected and used for analysis. Factor analysis, reliability analysis, and regression analysis were employed to analyze the data using SPSS software (ver. 21.0). According to the study results, if a fashion company CEO has higher emotional leadership, it leads to an increase in the job satisfaction and performance of the staff members, and an improvement in new product performance thanks to more investment and development and an expanded R&D staff. Additionally, the higher emotional leadership of the CEO contributes to an increase in operating profits, sales, and market share. Therefore, the importance of organizational culture was confirmed by its regulation effect on the emotional leadership and management performance of a fashion company. According to the results of this study, the emotional leadership of a CEO plays an important role in improving the performance of a fashion company, and future studies are needed to identify how to enhance the corporate performance of a fashion company from various perspectives.

Fashion industry pressure on natural resources has grown dramatically as consumption grew in emerging countries and the principle of rapid change of fashions extended to mass market in western counties, at the same time supply chains expanded globally to countries with lower labor and environmental standards creating critical sustainability challenges. Meanwhile, sustainability has become a hot topic for consumers that hold brands responsible for sustainability performances along the whole supply chain. The paper traces developments in the fashion business commitment to sustainability over two decades, with a focus on the implication for SCM. Academic literature focuses mainly on partial issues, missing the overall picture, the interaction among a complex set of factors, and to account for the role of past decisions and mistakes on current SSCM (sustainable supply chain management) strategy developments. The time span considered captures sustainability awareness in the fashion business which is in its statu nascenti (nascent state) and the trial and error process that led to progressive refinements of both means and ends. The paper provides an extensive review of academic articles, business reports, technical documents, regulations and direct information from the field and identifies five key lessons learnt in this process that influence current fashion business strategies in sustainability and SCM.

Conviviality is an interdisciplinary concept and a key phenomenon in the entrepreneurial communities. Entrepreneurial communities are social units that share values, experiences, emotions, rituals and traditions. They give rise to personal contact networks that are sets of formal or informal individual relationships. Conviviality means sharing, openness and participation; in this sense, it can be a tool to foster, animate and amalgamate a community. Thus, it can increase social relations that stably bind individuals and thus, becomes a source of business relations. Drawing from literature analysis and a case of a fashion entrepreneurial community, we propose to investigate how conviviality create an integration between social and business networks.

Corporate association—which refers to consumers’ beliefs, knowledge, perceptions, and evaluations of a corporation—can affect consumers’ purchasing intentions. Corporate association consists of corporate ability association and corporate social responsibility association. Corporate ability association refers to a company’s product quality, corporate innovation, productivity, consumer orientation, and after service. Corporate social responsibility association, which refers to the social perspective a company has of its responsibility to society, can affect corporate image and consumers’ purchasing intentions. Eco-labeling for protecting and sustaining the environment is one of the important green marketing strategies in the fashion business that can influence corporate association and consumers’ purchasing intentions. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of consumers’ eco-label recognition on their corporate association and intentions to purchase eco-friendly fashion products. Questionnaires were distributed to consumers. The 263 usable questionnaires that were returned were analyzed by descriptive statistics, Cronbach’s alpha, factor analysis, regression analysis, and t-test. The results were as follows: There was a significant effect of eco-label recognition on corporate association (ability association and social responsibility association). Eco-label recognition and corporate association were found to significantly affect consumers’ purchasing intentions. Regarding the eco-friendly fashion product buying experience, there was no significant difference on corporate association and buying intention, but there was significant difference on eco-label recognition.

This study analyzed fashion businesses based on the 6P's, products, prices, place, promotion, people, and patron for business owners in the Myeongdong commercial fashion district. Furthermore, this study proposed plans that would activate the Myeongdong fashion district and continuously develop it as a global fashion city. A survey was conducted from August to September, 2012 for 249 fashion business owners in Myeongdong. Eventually, only 208 questionnaires were used for the analysis. The research results were as follows. First, domestic brands have the largest share in the market and sales of fashion accessories were higher than the sales of clothes. Second, the prices for those fashion items ranged from low to mid-price. Third, the opening of new shops keeps increasing, and the size of the shops falls between ten and twenty pyeong generally. 'Self-production' was the highest form of production compared to any other form, and regarding importation sites, importation from overseas was the highest. Fourth, regarding promotion types, the sales in shops was the most commonly used promotion method compared to television and magazine advertising, and personal selling. Fifth, the proportion of male proprietors was larger than that of female proprietors. Most employees had less than five years of sales experience. Sixth, the main customers were females in their 20s and the proportions of Korean and foreign customers was similar.