Editorial: fashion supply chain management during and after the COVID-19 global pandemic

Citation

(2024), "Editorial: fashion supply chain management during and after the COVID-19 global pandemic", Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management, Vol. 28 No. 4, pp. 605-609. https://doi.org/10.1108/JFMM-07-2024-356

1. Background and Motivation

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a massive impact on almost every industry. It has triggered the biggest economic contraction since World War II, and the fashion industry is no exception. During the COVID-19 pandemic, quarantining and working from home changed consumer shopping behaviour and led to a decrease in fashion consumption (Zhao and Kim, 2021). Before the pandemic, in North America, the apparel, fashion, and beauty industry generated approximately US$600 billion in annual revenue and employs more than four million people (Baum et al., 2020). However, it is crystal clear from all industrial data that the fashion retail sector suffered significant declines in sales and traffic due to COVID-19. After three-month long store closures in 2020, many fashion companies experienced severe financial distress with negative earnings (Baum et al., 2020).

The supply chain refers to the process of producing, delivering, selling products, starting from raw materials and encompasses transportation, manufacturing, packaging, warehousing, and retailing (Choi et al., 2019). Due to the carousel of lockdowns, fashion companies faced supply chain delays, factory and store closures, trade show and fashion week cancellations, sourcing and production postponement and demand disruption (Xu et al., 2020). All these comprise an unprecedented scenario that may be continuously affected by the second, third (and …) waves of the outbreaks. The fashion industry is under immense pressure as a result. Depending on their role in the supply chain, countries may require different strategies to build resilience (Shen and Sun, 2023). The outbreak of COVID-19 has prompted managers to rethink and restructure the fashion supply chain system to reduce supply risks (Choi and Shi, 2022; Xu et al., 2023b). It is advisable for garment manufacturers to invest in technological innovations to improve their competitiveness, through aspects such as significantly reducing sample lead time and enhancing product quality (Mostafiz et al., 2022).

The COVID-19 global outbreak has completely changed our daily lives and business environments (Shen et al., 2023a). During the pandemic, there were significant challenges related to the storage of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), a crucial aspect of the textile supply chain (Xu et al., 2023a). The textile related PPE such as gloves, medical masks, and gowns were essential to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and helped protect healthcare workers on the pandemic's frontline (Shen et al., 2023b). The pandemic also resulted in an increase in demand for fashionable PPE (Zhao and Kim, 2021). Wearing facemasks might not only become a normal habit for many consumers after the COVID-19 (Phau et al., 2023), but might also ring the bell that the fashion supply chain is critically important in terms of localization, responsiveness, and agility (Xu et al., 2020). It is important to minimize supply risk by utilizing supply chain contracts in the new post-pandemic normal (Choi and Shi, 2022).

In this special issue, we feature articles which find important managerial insights and viewpoints regarding solutions from fashion supply chain management to cope with the related challenges during and after COVID-19.

2. Guide to the special issue papers

This special issue publishes original research articles on fashion supply chain management during and after the COVID-19 global pandemic. After a rigorous review process, we have selected 4 research papers to be included in this special issue. In the following, we discuss insights into how the featured articles contribute to fashion operations and supply chain management literature. We present the articles in alphabetical order by the last name of the leading author, as shown below.

Chan et al. (2023) investigated the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on marketing and operational strategies. The authors conducted a qualitative exploratory case study in a Hong Kong footwear enterprise, which is a leading footwear brand in designing, manufacturing, and retailing trendy womens shoes with a diverse range of modern footwear products. It is well-agreed that fashionable products should be operated in a quick response manner. Chan et al. (2023) found that adopting omni-channel retailing, quick response and mixed production strategies, and collaborating with e-tailers during the pandemic were effective to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has illustrated the importance of the technologies application in terms of increasing the ease of accessibility to the consumers and providing a better customer service. Their results suggest that better customer relationship management and demand forecasting and inventory planning are important for business recovery after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Phau et al. (2023) studied the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the effect of terminal and instrumental values on the attitude and brand desirability for upcycled luxury designer facemasks. The authors conducted a quantitative approach, and data were collected from 390 existing Australian luxury consumers. An actual Burberry-branded facemask was designed for the study. They found that consumers did not perceive that Burberry's facemasks are made from upcycled remnant materials. The results showed that the facemask company should better design the product having a balance between safety features and luxury desirability. Terminal and instrumental values had no influence on the attitude and brand desirability for upcycled PPE. The paper also identified that different upcycling facemask in the name of sustainable practices might have different functions for the choices of facemasks after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Su et al. (2023) examined the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on global textile and apparel supply chain. The authors employed a qualitative research approach to conduct interviews in Bangladesh and China. The theory of dynamic capabilities was applied to explain the research findings on how fashion supply chain was disrupted by COVID-19 and what opportunities for coping COVID-19 were created. The study found that the textile and apparel industry was vulnerable to the adverse economic ramifications of the COVID-19 outbreak. Thus, developing a risk management mechanism in the textile and apparel supply chain during the COVID-19 pandemic was crucial. The study also highlighted the importance of capabilities in network collaboration and inter-organizational sharing in textile and apparel supply chains. Network collaboration and inter-organizational sharing were found to play important roles in mitigating disruption and quickly returning to normal after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sugg (2023) evaluated the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on circular textile innovation. The author conducted serial, semi-structured, qualitative interviews in June 2020, right after the UK's first national lockdown in the country. The authors found that the fashion designers were conservative and willing to produce “safe” designs during the COVID-19 pandemic. They were less willing to invest in circular textiles compared with the time before the pandemic. This study contributed by advancing our understandings towards the principles of the circular economy within textiles and design during the COVID-19 pandemic, and provided new insights into the strategic benefits of maintaining strong buyer–supplier relationships. All these could help circular textile buyers to lower costs, improve lead times, and access scares and valuable skills and resources after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Based on the above 4 articles, the important strategies of fashion supply chain management during and after the COVID-19 pandemic are summarised in Table I.

3. Conclusions and future directions

Based on the published four papers in this special issue, new managerial insights into fashion supply chain management during and after COVID-19 global pandemic are obtained. During the COVID-19 pandemic, omni-channel retailing, quick response, mixed production strategies, collaboration with e-tailers, having a balance between safety features and luxury desirability, risk management, and producing “safe” designs are effective strategies to cope with COVID-19. After COVID-19, the strategies including customer relationship management, demand forecasting and inventory planning, sustainable practices, network collaboration, inter-organizational sharing, and buyer–supplier relationships are crucially important for business recovery and growth.

The future research directions on fashion supply chain management related to COVID-19 are as follows. First, after encountering the challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers have reevaluated their lifestyle and fashion retailers should revamp business models (Li, 2023). In future research, it would be interesting and important to examine what and how new fashion business models can better address supply and demand mismatches, enhance consumer satisfaction, and ensure supply chain sustainability. Second, the COVID-19 pandemic has reminded people of the importance of supply chain resilience (Shen and Sun, 2023). Future research should focus on studying the mechanisms to enhance supply chain resilience in the fashion industry. Third, with the rapid advancement of new disruptive technologies (Choi et al., 2022) such as drones, robots, machine learning, artificial intelligence and blockchain during the years of COVID-19, the fashion supply chain is undergoing a transformation (Xiong et al., 2021). It is valuable to evaluate the effects of utilizing new technologies on fashion supply chain performance.

Bin Shen

Glorious Sun School of Business and Management, Donghua University, Shanghai, China

Tsan-Ming Choi

Centre for Supply Chain Research, University of Liverpool Management School,Liverpool, UK

Na liu

School of Business, Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology, Beijing, China

Li Zhao

Department of Textile and Apparel Management, University of Missouri, Columbia,Missouri, USA, and

Jochen Strähle

Faculty Textiles and Design, Reutlingen University, Reutlingen, Germany

Table I.

Fashion Supply Chain Strategies during and after the COVID-19 Pandemic

Paper	Fashion Supply Chain Strategies
	During the COVID-19 pandemic	After the COVID-19 pandemic
Chan et al. (2023)	Omni-channel retailing, quick response, mixed production strategies, and collaboration with e-tailers	Customer relationship management and demand forecasting and inventory planning
Phau et al. (2023)	Having a balance between safety features and luxury desirability	Sustainable practices
Su et al. (2023)	Risk management	Network collaboration and inter-organizational sharing
Sugg (2023)	Producing “safe” designs	Maintaining strong buyer–supplier relationships

Source: Table created by Author