Last week, Inditex – the Spanish fast fashion giant that owns Zara – opened its first Lefties store in Liverpool. The chain, new to the UK, uses self-checkouts and robotic sorting systems to bolster efficiency and reduce overheads. The launch has been described as an attempt to compete with Primark and SHEIN on price.
Looking at Zara’s brand image relative to these two competitors may shine some light on the decision to launch the new cut-price chain in the UK.
Data from YouGov BrandIndex shows that Impression scores for Zara are 16.8: considerably ahead of Primark (6.7) and SHEIN’s (-19.6) scores. It also outperforms in terms of Quality: scores are 14.7 compared to -27.7 for Primark and -31.7 for SHEIN. It’s the same story for Recommend scores (Zara: 12.8; Primark: 7.3; SHEIN: -31.7).
But other metrics tell a different story. While Zara (5.7) beats SHEIN (-3.8) on Value, it is a narrower gap – and Primark’s scores are four times higher (24.0). Its Consideration scores (16.7) are also nearly half those of Primark (30.8), and six points ahead of SHEIN’s scores for the same measure (10.7).
Index scores, which measure brand health by combining several key metrics, indicate that Zara outperforms the other two brands (Zara: 12.9; Primark: 2.6; SHEIN: -15.7), but it is not necessarily the ideal vehicle for the value end of the market. Commentators have described Zara as “budget friendly but not cheap” – it is worn by celebrities and is considered to be trending more upmarket. Lefties, for its part, has been identified as an attempt to offer Zara-style fashions at Primark-style prices.
The performance of Lefties in the UK will show over time, but Inditex’s new offering may be attractive to consumers who are sensitive to both costs and trends.