Customer relationships and supply chain management in the fast fashion industry

Since the 1990s, the concept of customer relationship management (CRM) has emerged in the marketing literature by stimulating the interest of the academic community. It involves the integration of supply chain functions in order to achieve a greater efficiency in delivering and improving customer value. This chapter focuses on the fast fashion industry that represents a fascinating domain in which to investigate the management of customer relationships due to its particular features of short life cycle products, volatile demand, and high level of impulse purchase. In order to grow in the long term, fast fashion companies deal with a wide range of information to develop a good understanding of market trends. To date, few studies have examined CRM in the fast fashion industry, and thus, this research is addressed to contribute to filling this gap. The analysis of the key functions of fast fashion supply chains from a CRM perspective has been carried out and findings have highlighted an interesting strategic shift from simply meeting customers' needs to driving customers' behaviors.