Tom Ford’s Luxury Global Village
Former Gucci & YSL Designer to Launch a Global Empire
With a major conglomerate of international luxury firms behind him, Tom Ford launches his brand on a global scale.
Ever since fashion designer and marketer extraordinaire Tom Ford revived Gucci in the 90s, transforming the dormant line into one of the hottest labels in fashion – while simultaneously holding the Creative Director post at YSL to great critical acclaim & commercial success, no less – his name has been synonymous with successful luxury fashion marketing.
Following a breakdown in contract negotiations in 2003, Ford and his business partner, Domenico De Sole, exited the Gucci Group. A cosmetics & fragrance collaboration with Estee Lauder followed, as well as a line of sunglasses, both successful but in no way comparable to the designer’s former level of prestige & influence. However, Ford now seems poised to once again summit the fashion foodchain with his latest venture: a line of luxury men’s accessories, Savile Row-inspired suits and bespoke tailoring, and a flagship store in New York – described to WWD by Tommy Fazio, men’s fashion director at Bergdorf Goodman as “the best execution ... of mixing Old World haberdashery with a modernistic approach.” Such is Ford’s cache with the fashion elite that at the initial presentation of the concept in his Milan showroom in late 2006, retailers attending the presentation were only briefed on the concept and the marketing plan, but were shown no actual product…and were still ready to sign on. "Tom is such a talent that everyone's hot to get their arms around what he's doing," Linda Fargo, the fashion director for Bergdorf Goodman, told the New York Post:"Even without seeing the product, retailers are ready to sign on the dotted line."
Ford and De Sole have now teamed up with an impressive roster of global luxury heavyweights including Lane Crawford Joyce Group (Asia), Villa Moda and UAE Trading (Middle East), Mercury (Russia), Trois Pommes (Switzerland), Daslu (Brazil), Harrods (London), and the Neiman Marcus Group (U.S.). A virtually unstoppable fashion marketing juggernaut, the group plans to plaster the globe with the Tom Ford name and his brand of old-world indulgence – think men’s velvet slippers with lush embroidery - with 100 in-shop & freestanding stores over the next decade, franchise stores in Moscow, Zurich, St. Moritz, Hong Kong, Beijing, Kuwait, Dubai and Qatar, and a Milan flagship (in the works for next year).
Initially, the brand will be exclusive to an in-store shop in NYC’s Bergdorf Goodman for a year, after which the global rollout machine will kick into action with in-store shops planned for Harrods in London, Daslu in Sao Paulo, and Joyce Boutique stores in both Tokyo and Osaka. The buying power of the Asian market is so impressive that almost 90 franchised Tom Ford stores are planned for the region, including Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Macau, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Australia. “This is a great day for us as we have now laid the foundation necessary to become a true global luxury brand,” Ford recently told WWD. “The plan will allow us the platform needed to reach and service our customers worldwide.”
