Hollywood Gets the Couture Bug
The Entertainment Industry Enters the Fashion Business in Earnest
Are the next garmentos from Tinseltown? Hollywood hits Seventh Avenue to shop for fashion companies to acquire.
"The entertainment and fashion businesses are very similar in that you assemble talent, create product and put it out there," Eric M. Beder, senior vice president of New York-based investment banking firm Brean, Murray, Carret & Co., recently told WWD about the growing mashup of fashion and entertainment.
Influential designers have been steadily injecting more elements of entertainment into their presentation: the Louis Vuitton flagship in Paris features art (including artist Olafur Eliasson’s blackout elevator) as do many of the Hermès stores, and design duo Dolce & Gabbana recently announced a new project that will incorporate shopping and music events. At the same time, the entertainment industry has been incurably bitten by the fashion bug. Celebs have moved from merely sporting designer on the red carpet (Uma Thurman famously in lavender Prada) to starring in major fashion ad campaigns (Nicole Kidman for Chanel), designing their own lines (Jessica Simpson’s Shoes, Bags & Denim; Mary-Kate & Ashley Olsen at Wal-Mart; Mandy Moore’s Mblem; Beyonce’s House of Dereon; Madonna for H&M; Jay-Z’s Rocawear; Sarah Jessica Parker’s affordable “Bitten” line for Steve & Barry’s) and financing fashion insiders: American Idol’s Simon Fuller partnering with both Roland Mouret’s new RM label and Victoria Beckham’s DVB line, and Harvey Weinstein purchasing Halston.
"Entertainment plays a more critical role in driving brand awareness than ever before," notes David Baram of The Firm, a talent management firm in Beverly Hills that purchased Pony in 2001 for two years. “The barriers between the two businesses have been broken down. The world is now about the lifestyle of the consumer: what he or she wears, consumes, listens to, travels to, etc.... {The] element of lifestyle and crossover appeal has attracted entertainment executives to fashion,” agrees Oliver Peoples CEO, David Schulte.
The reason both industries have so much in common is that they basically sell different versions of the same thing: fantasy. “[Entertainment specialists] know how to create value by creating new concepts, new ideas,” explains luxury & fashion consultant Concetta Lanciaux. “Basically, it's an industry of intangibles. In the film industry, you don't make money rationally. You make money by creating something completely out of the blue that inspires consumers."
Adds Pierre Mallevays of luxury goods mergers and acquisitions firm Savigny Partners: “Fashion lends itself extremely well to licensing, and the entertainment industry has been making licensing deals for a number of years. That's a key aspect of the industry."
And lastly, there is sex appeal. "There's a certain allure and sexiness to buying fashion that you're not going to get from buying a cement company," notes Robert Burke of luxury consultancy Robert Burke Associates in NYC. "No one is better at image and mystique than a great entertainment executive,” agrees Oliver People’s Schulte, which bodes well for a cooler shopping experience and snazzier branding. “If the cultural vibe is right for more celebrities to promote brands, good executives will know how to leverage this."
