Centric Software® is delighted to announce the release of a success story about its customer, Guess.
Guess is an iconic fashion brand created over 40 years ago by the Marciano brothers. Since then, Guess has grown from a denim pioneer into a global brand with over 1,600 retail stores worldwide and offers collections for men, women and children, as well as a wide range of accessories, from jewelry, fragrances, eyewear, to watches, shoes and bags.
Guess was on a path to replace Excel spreadsheets for buying and merchandising with an end-to-end digital solution to manage their 8,000-SKU-collections, with 4 collections released per year.
Then, the pandemic hit, bringing with it uncertainty. Capital spending came to a halt. Guess faced the same issues as the rest of the fashion industry, however in a bold move, the company decided to invest in technology during a time of market disruption, to bolster planning with Centric Planning. Says Daniel Botey, VP of Global Inventory Management at Guess Europe Sagl, “…Our need for a tool was even more urgent under the circumstances. So we revived the [planning] project during the first lockdown.”
Their foresight paid off. Margins have gone up even though foot traffic in their retail stores is still down. This was due in large part to Guess’ pre-pandemic game plan to increase margins, but the ability to shift merchandise across channels—something that was very difficult to do in a timely manner prior to Centric Planning—also played a role. Botey points out, “If we had had a lot of inventory, we could not have done it. Centric Planning has been an enabler to truly follow our strategy and increase our profitability in a very, very big way.”
