PROJECT REPORT

Hennes & Mauritz (H&M)

M.Com IV Sem –Marketing Management
(Session 2020-21)

THE BHOPAL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Submitted To Submitted By
Dr. Amrita Sahu Khushboo Toppo
Associate Professor Roll No.- 19103029
Department of Commerce

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 CERTIFICATE FROM THE PROJECT GUIDE

This is to certify that the Project Report titled “Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) ” is a bonafide work of
Khushboo Toppo enrolment number - R170190280458 undertaken for the partial fulfillment of
Masters in Commerce (M. Com) degree of Barkatullah University under my guidance. This project
work is original and has not been submitted earlier for the award of any degree or diploma of any
other University or Institution.

Signature of the Guide

Dr. Amrita Sahu
Associate Professor
Department of Commerce,
BSSS, Bhopal

DECLARATION

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 I KHUSHBOO TOPPO daughter of Petrus Toppo certify that the project report entitled on
“Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) ”, Marketing analysis report on Hennes &Mauritz (H&M) , prepared by
me is my personal and is authentic work under the guidance of Dr. Amrita Sahu, Associate
Professor, Department of Commerce.

Date: 15/06/2021 Signature of the Student

Place: BHOPAL Name: Khushboo Toppo
Class: M.COM (IV SEMESTER)
Roll Number: 19103029

Table of content
S.NO PARTICULARS

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 1. Introduction of company :-
History
Product
Mission
Vision
Brand USP

2. Objective of analysis

3. Marketing strategy

4. Marketing Mix

5. Consumer Analysis

6. Sales

7. Sustainability Initiatives by H&M

8. Conclusion

9. Reference

Introduction and History

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H&M is multinational clothing-retail company known for its fast fashion clothing for men women,
teenagers and children. It is the second largest global clothing retail, behind spain based Zara company. As
of November 2019, H&M Operate in 74 countries with over 5,000 stores and also company have made
its online shopping available in 33 countries.

The company was founded in 1947 by Erling Persson with very first shop established in Västerås , Sweden
. The original name of shop was called “Hennes” which is Swedish for “hers” as the store at the time
exclusively sold womenswear. It wasn’t until 1968 when person acquired the hunting apparel brand
Mauritz Widforss that he changed the name of the company to Hennes & Mauritz t o reflect the brand
inclusion of menswear into the product range . Soon after the merger and the official rebranding into the
shortened H&M the company’s expansion gradually began to expand outside of Sweden’s borders.

In 1976 the first store outside Sweden opened in London , H&M continued to grow on Europe began to
retail online in 1998

Product of H&M

The H&M also include other brands like – COS, Monki, Weekday Cheap Monday, H&M Home and
ARKET. Together these brand offer customer a wealth of styles and trends in fashion, beauty, accessories
and homewares for Women, Men and for children.

Mision of H&M

The prime focus of H&M is to serve fashion and quality at the best price in sustainable way. The
believe that they should have best customer offering in each and every market and offer collection
that are wide ranging and varied for women, men, teenagers and children. For them design, quality
and sustainability are not a question of price but ability to offer inspiring fashion with unbeatable
value for money.

Vision of H&M

H&M’s business operations aims to run in a way that is economically, socially and
environmentally sustainable where it means that the need of both present and future generations
must be fulfilled.

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USP of H&M

H&M works on a business concept of fashion for all, where this venture serves the customer with
stylish clothes, classic look at the affordable price. Also the tie ups of H&M with big designers
have helped them to establish themselves among the best fast fashion retailers where they provide
the consumer with best designs from the popular designers at an affordable price due to their
effective logistics

Obejective of Analysis

The main obejective of this internship project is deep study of

1. Learn about brand ( H&M )

2. To know How H&M became world’s 2nd largest fashion brand.
3. To find out the marketing strategy of H&M
4. Consumer behaivour of H&M

Marketing Strategy of H&M

Marketing strategy is very essential for each business, marketing is way to communicate and to
reach your target consumer. Choosing correct strategy make your brand grow, so H&M has
different marketing technique to communicate to its consumer and this make H&M 2nd largest
fashion retailer. Once Jorgen Andersson, the marketing director of H&M was asked what is the
secret of so called “Stockhlom syndrome” , with first Ikea democratizing interior design, now
H&M doing the same thing with fashion, to this he answerd that this is not only a business idea,
but rather a political one, providing every person with equal choices as you do not have to be rich
to appreciate good design. He also added owes its success to three factor :-

1.Innovative design that is always on trend

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2.The best quality at best price

3.Efficient logistic

H&M engages various marketing techniques which purpose is to attract customers. The realization
of chosen methods will be extensively discussed below :-

1.Partnership with designers and celebrities.

In 2004 H&M took an effort to collaborate with famous fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, who
decided to create exclusive line for the brand. It was very bold and innovative move , as until then
partnership between high fashion designer and retail fashion had never happened. The launch of
Lagerfeld’s collection was great success after that brand decided partnership with guest designer
on regular basis and included as long term marketing plan. Later H&M also worked with huge industry
names like Stella McCartney, Roberto Cavalli, Sonia Rykiel or 51 Donatella Versace and as a result it
increased its sales .

Additionally, a side from famous fashion directors, H&M collaborated with pop icons and fashion experts
like Madonna, Kylie Minogue or Anna Dello Russo, as they are an inherent part of today's pop culture. Due
to this partnership H&M gained a competitive advantage over other brand.

2.Sales promotion or discount.

Price reduction is another tool traditionally practiced by retail companies. In 2005 the brand used
different approach to regular reduction of price by sale and discount to sell out previous collection.
Brand gave different price reduction upto 50% and made their customer to grab the benefit from
sales and discount.

4.Advertisment.

H&M has been going upmarket, so as its' advertisement campaigns. The Swedish brand H&M
has been creating simple and effective ads. The company applies several different communication
tools in their advertising activities. The most popular are ad campaigns featured in fashion
magazines or as a part of editorials. Actually, H&M was one of the first high street fashion brands
featured in high fashion magazines like Vogue or Harper's Bazzar next to Gucci, Chanel or
Christian Dior.

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In their ads, they feature international super model and singers like Adriana Lima, Doutzen Krause,
Cara Delevigne, Beyonce or Lady Gaga. Hence featuring famous people from music and entertainment
industry seems to be one of the most appealing marketing activities, encouraging customers that they can
dress as they role models.

5.Social Media

Social media has become an important platform for all the brand to reach their target customer. Like other
brands H&M has also understood the benefit of social media and how it can get the message out as well as
promote the brand customer. . In order to foster the relationship build with H&M's loyal customers, the
brand is present on four different social media channels.

1. Facebook :-

Facebook like many other brands is also the primary platform for social media marketing
for H&M. There are 32 million followers of the brand in Facebook. It post regular updates
about the new products and designs as well as any events or marketing campaigns it
organizes. It uses videos and pictures that give an inside the store glimpse as well as
showcase the newest styles available. However, more than that facebook account serves as
a platform to engage the customers and visitors, satisfied and disappointed customers both
talk to the brand through its Facebook page and express their joy or dissatisfaction as they
like. In this way, Facebook provides for efficient communication between the brand and
its customers effectively.

2. Instagram :-

Instagram is another important stop for the brand where it has showcased its brand and its
products beautifully. Instagram acts as an effective platform for customer and fan
engagement. People can like your post and follow your brand as well as comment on your
posts. It is great for marketing of those brands that mainly use images for marketing. H&M
has made 3761 posts on Instagram and has 22.9 million followers, following its brand.
This is a very high number and reflects the kind of success H&M has achieved by
marketing on Instagram.

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 3. Twitter :-

H&M has also used Twitter for effective marketing of its brands and products. There are
different Twitter accounts for different markets like H&M USA, H&M Canada, H&M
Belgium and H&M UK. Its main Twitter account has more than 8.6 million followers. The
brand uses Twitter to showcase its products and brands and to engage the customers. Some
features in Twitter are similar to that of Facebook. It can be used to showcase large size
images and videos. The Twitter feeds flow like news clips which provides for better user
engagement.

4. Youtube :-

Youtube is a great platform for engaging fans and followers. H&M has showcased more
than 650 videos in its YouTube account. The focus is not just marketing of products or
brands but to create long term relationships with the customers through deeper
engangement. H&M does not just promote its products, but there are also how to videos
included. Its YouTube account has more than 261k subscribers.

Marketing Mix of H&M

Marketing is “an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and
delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the
organization and its stakeholders”. When a company wants to elaborate its international
marketing plan, it is necessary to take into account the traditional 4 P: product (or service),
price, place and promotion.

The marketing mix used by H&M is as follows :-

1. Product – Vast Vast range of clothing and other items with a lower price range and a decent
quality. All products are inspired by the latest Catwalk trends.

2. Price -H&M has adopted a pricing strategy that has broader pricing range to suit every sphere
of buyer. In order to maintain a median pricing strategy, The company also offers various discounts
and schemes on their core and fresh stocks.

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3. Place – H&m stores are located in convenient location. They also have online website hm.com,
which give consumer easy access to their product . Consumer have the opportunity to browse amd
order products anytime and anywhere.

4. Promotiom - H&M focuses a vast amount of time on Promotion and advertising. Direct
marketing is also used as part of H&Ms campaign. H&M uses Celebrities, press and Bloggers to
carry out the advertising message. Social Media, Video and print to make its products and services
known to its customers.

Consumer Anlaysis
The new age of retailing is characterized by the changing relationships between retailers and their
customers. More specifically, H&M belongs to a group of retailers, which learned how to drive
the market by driving the consumers’ behaviours instead of being driven by them .
To analyse consumer buying behavior for H&M a closed ended & non-disguised questionnairewas
prepared with structured set of questions. The data was collected from a sample size of 99.
1. Age of respondents.

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 Age of the Respondant.

5%

18 - 22 years
37%
23 - 27 years

58% 28 - 32 years

2. The occupation was divided into 3 sectors as – Homemakers, Working and Student. The
majority of the respondents constitute students as 74%.

Occupation of Respondents.
4%
22%

Working

Students
74%
Homemaker

3. The introducing question concerning the H&M brand was to examine, if respondents buy
H&M’s products. The results were more than positive, as up to 91% of respondents admitted that

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they shop at H&M. The main reasons for that were keeping up with the latest trends from the
runways, impeccable design and affordable price. This result confirms that the brand skillfully
spreads their philosophy of the best clothes for the best price. Yet, still 9 % expressed a negative
opinion of H&M’s products

Do you buy H&M products?

9%

Yes

91% No

4. In the second question respondents were asked to choose up to three sentences that the best
describe their feelings as well as connotations connected with H&M. The most popular answers
chosen by respondents were related to following the latest trends (28%) and low prices (25%),
which seems to be H&M’s philosophy of fashionable clothes for the best price. Other opinions
were divided with no significant prevalence of a certain view. Equally, 16% of respondents
associated H&M brand with low quality products and cooperating with well-known designers,
which might indicate that they have some doubts about the quality of limited designer’s wear.
8% claimed that the company is innovative and 5% described the brand’s products as high quality.
Nonetheless, such low percent does not stop respondents from buying H&M’s products, as it is
seen in the previous question.

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 Select answers (max 3) that you associate
with H&M.
5%
16%
16% High quality of products
Low quality of products
2% High prices of products
Low price of products
Innovation
28%
Following with latest trend
25%
Collabration with designers

8%

5. Another question was designed to examine influence of sales promotion on respondents’

shopping behavior. 76% claimed that reduction of prices in H&M’s stores encourage them to make
a purchase. Again, it is a confirmation of the dominance that this promotional tool contributes to
H&M’s strategies.

Does sale promotion introduced in H&M

storesencourage you to buy products of the
brands ?

24%

yes
No

76%

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6.Does celebrity endorsement encourage to buy ?
64% of respondents admitted that celebrity endorsements do not influence their decision whether
to purchase a certain product. This result may arise from young people’s awareness of marketing
strategies used by various organizations. They realize that featuring famous faces in a brand’s
campaign or Tv commercial is a method to affect their preferences. Respondents select products
based on style and quality, not on a person that is advertised by. However, 36% declared that
celebrity endorsements encourage them to buy a product of a certain brand.

Do celebrity endorsement encourage you to

buy a product of certain brand ?

36%

Yes
No

64%

7. Next question concerned direct marketing activities, specifically the effectiveness of H&M’s
website in communication with customers. 79% of respondents admitted that they have visited the
website. It is very high score and might be the reason why the Swedish company gained
competitive advantage over their rivals through the years. This also indicates an excellent brand’s
awareness among customers and efficient communication by means of the Internet. All elements
of promotion should complement each other and it is clear that H&M besides good results in
traditional methods achieves additional publicity through alternative techniques.

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 Have you ever visited H&M site (hm.com) ?

21%

Yes
79%
No

8. Following question was intended to examine respondents’ feelings towards H&M’s

collaboration with social networks like Lookbook.nu, where users share their pictures including
outfits. 91 % stated that organizing contests on Lookbook is a good way of promoting the brand.
The results prove that young people are technologically advanced and often seek the way to
communicate or reach a company by themselves. Consequently, communication means like social
networks are excellent tools to approach the target group.

Is H&M collaboration with fashion social

networks (lookbook.nu) in organizing
contests for user a good way of promotion ?

9%

Yes
No

91%

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Challenges Faced by H&M

1. H&M was slow to sell online.

H&M’s strategy has been heavily focused on its store outlets, and this is understandable given
the success the brand has enjoyed. However, it’s arguable that this focus meant that H&M was
too slow to see the potential of e-commerce.
H&M only started selling online in 2010, a decade after ASOS appeared. It seems that the
retailer was slow to see the opportunity that e-commerce presented, or else thought that its store
network was enough to see off online competition.
The sites were poorly designed too, with many usability flaws which made it harder to drive
sales from the site. It has improved since, but the H&M site was deeply flawed in the first years
after launch.
In addition, this delayed launch online means that, while rivals like ASOS have gained their
online offering, H&M has had less time to learn and improve online
2. To slow for fast fashion.
Many fast fashion brands have focused their sourcing closer to home to increase efficiency and
turnover rates. For example Zara, based in Spain, sources from Spain, Portugal, Turkey and
Morocco. This has allowed quick turnovers from concept to store within two weeks for repeat
orders and five weeks for new products. Including 10 logistics centers in Spain allowing them to
deliver anywhere in the world within 48 hours.
On the other hand, H&M has been falling behind in speed and innovation. Karl-Johan Persson,
chief executive of H&M said that the company’s supply chain practices remained the same
while the world had changed. By sourcing from Asia, H&M was able to keep costs low. But this
meant longer lead time, varying from a few weeks to six months.
This hindered their ability to adapt to consumer demands and changes as quickly as Boohoo,
ASOS and Missguided that update their websites with up to 100 to 4,500 products daily.
Altogether, H&M loses out on the idea of “newness” that defines the fast fashion industry.
3. In year 2020, H&M decide to closes 250 stores
In year 2020 due to covid-19 H&M sales drop to 50%, because of this H&M decide to shut 250
stores around the world. The main reason of shutting down stores is shift focus on online
shopping. To cope with these changes h&m decide to accelerate its plan in digital investment so
online demand from consumer can be meet.

Sales of the H&M Group worldwide from 2007 to 2020

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According to graph :-
1. This statistic depicts the sales of the H&M Group worldwide from 2007 to 2020. In fiscal year
2020, global net sales of the H&M Group amounted to about 20.2 billion U.S. dollars
2. Since 2009 – 2017 there is positive growth in sales of h&m.
3. In 2020 sales was reduced due to covid-19 pandemic. Covid made countries to go on
lockdown, restriction was made on mobility . this made large shift of offline shoppinf to online
shopping, still only basic necessity was allowed to to online order. Being clothing store H&M
sale was reduced.

Sustainability
environment.
important
due
increasing
to consumers’ for
awareness
fashion
is significantly
Sustainabilty initiatives by H&M
ofbusiness
Sustainability is significally important for fashion because due to consumer increasing awareness
of enviroment . H&M recognize the importance of sustainability and incorporate green practices
to its supply chain. Some sustainable practice of h&m:-

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1. Eco- material prepration : for many years H&M has used organic cotton for production also
invested in cotton production. In order to guarantee that farmer produce real organic cotton,
H&M involve in global project called “Better Cotton Initiatve” which provide better farming
techniques to farmers.
H&M also corperate with World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in the strategy to save water,
they changed their textile production to consume water. H&M aims at sending zero waste from
organization to landfills. To save energy and water they also use recycle products like recycled
polyster, recycled polymaid, recycled plastic and recycled wool in their product line.
2. Sustainable manufacturing : Through local sourcing h&m reduces the amount of product
waste and carbon emission in the production and distribution process.As a strategy this method
supply inventory in time in response quick fashion market but also avoid wastage of product and
carbon emission.
3. Green distribution : It was estimated that half of carbon emission at H&M are due to
transportation , they realized it started using clean and safe mode in transportation. If road
transport has to be used then H&M train their truck driver and also does not use truck which
have been used for more than 10 years.
H&M also use customize transport packing according to quality and environmental
requirements, so they can also reuse transport box.
4. Green retailing : Cosumer can return the old clothes to all H&M store all over the countries.
In return consumer can get 15% discount in next purchase. By offering reward H7m makes less
ethical people to act responsible toward environment.

Conclusion
H&M have been developed as strong and sustainable brand where the product is well adapted
to the needs of consumer. They have showed the market through their marketing that fashion
is not very expensive, they brought the runway clothes in daily life of people.
H&M uses different marketing strategy to promote their brand and increase sale ,but they are
slow to adapt in online sale. In year 2021 their main focus is increase online sale as people are
shifting in online shopping.

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H&M also uses environment friendly product through their brand they also make their
consumer aware about sustainability.

Reference
H&M social media marketing. https://notesmatic.com/hm-social-media-marketing-strategy/
What went wrong with H&M ? https://omnilytics.co/blog/what-went-wrong-with-hm
Coronavirus: H&M to close 250 shops as Covid drives sales online
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54369802

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H&M Marketing mix. https://www.mbaskool.com/marketing-mix/services/16924-h-and-m.html
About H&M https://www.hm.com/entrance.ahtml?orguri=%2F
Sales graph https://www.statista.com/statistics/252190/gross-sales-of-the-h-und-m-group-
worldwide/
Sustainability initative by H&M https://hmgroup.com/sustainability/

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