Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Stella McCartney Inks a Deal With Gap, Inc.



Gap, Inc. has announced a deal with Stella McCartney to create collections for its Baby Gap and Gap Kids lines. The collections are slated to be launched later this year in its stores in the U.S., U.K., France, Japan, Ireland, Canada, and on its website.

While McCartney has said she has always wanted to design clothing for children, this will be her first foray into this market:

'For years I’ve wanted to create a collection for kids,' McCartney said. 'It’s something I’ve often been asked about. I believe that this one-off collaboration will be a great way for customers to be able to participate in the Stella McCartney brand. I believe that kids’ clothing should be more accessibly priced, which is particularly important at the moment, given the current climate.'

I applaud Stella McCartney for viewing this current market as an opportunity to reach out to a larger consumer base. As I have written before, I support legislation which protects designers' creative intellectual work but I do think that designers can work with consumers by versioning.

Versioning provides a decent solution to piracy by allowing designers to create pieces that are their own creative work at lower price points (Target and H&M work with designers all of the time to do this). This allows potential counterfeit goods consumers to purchase legitimate designer wear at a price point that the consumer can afford. It allows the designer to profit from mass production rather than giving pirates more incentive to create knockoffs. It also allows smaller trendier designers to get more of a consumer base so that they are not put in the position that Trovata found itself in.

Translation: The more consumers are aware of your name, designs, and style, the harder it is for places like Forever21 knockoff off your work. Smaller designers can claim trade dress more effectively because likelihood of consumer confusion would be more apparent.

I can't wait to see what Stella churns out for Gap!

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