Whenever I’ve been out with friends recently, the conversation has tended to revolve around subjects a bit outside my personal experience, like primary school places and Baby Ballet. Yes, 90% of my friends now come complete with small children – they’ve moved into the next stage of their lives. In contrast I haven’t got kids (and for long and complicated reasons can’t see children on my horizon), which sometimes leaves me with nothing to contribute to the conversation.
It strikes me that there must be a few brands out there in a sort of similar situation. The original core customers have moved into a new lifestage – but taken the brand with them. So you end up with Samantha Cameron wearing Topshop at the same time as a load of fourteen year olds. Who the heck are they supposed to market at?
It can only be a matter of time before Topshop stops trying to be all-things-to-all-women and starts chucking out a few proper sub-brands. I seem to have ended up as Aunty Gemma in several households. Perhaps it’s time to open some nice stores next door to Boden and Jigsaw called Topshop Collection?
Kind of the opposite problem that Burberry had when it became adopted by arseholes as part of their uniform.