The Role of the Assistant Buyer

In this second blog entry, I’d like to share a few reflections upon the role of the assistant buyer. The work is primarily administrative with main activities including taking care of and following up orders, handling samples, style and material analysis, following up sales, pricing, and registering all different kinds of changes along the process. You also need to stay à jour on trends and the fashion market. Many tasks may seem routine-like; however, since you are involved in a continuous process of developing new products there is a lot of dynamism and variation to the work. You use administrative programs and tools and you communicate mostly per email. You work with multiple collections simultaneously; at this company the assistant buyer engages in at least three seasons at a time. “Drops” are smaller collections that are released or portioned out throughout the year. There is a lot of deadlines and changes in timing and transportation modes etc. to keep track on and to keep in order. Therefore, it helps to be organized and to constantly stay available and responsive to act quickly in communication, decision-making and problem-solving. You don’t want to lose one single day because there are preset production and logistics schedules to follow and the timing for the distribution center, stores, photo shootings and campaigns must be right. The garments may not arrive too late, and - which may be a bit frustrating before you get used to it - not too early either!

Individual field study 2

Summer has passed fast and I have tried to work on my research as much as I’ve possible could beside my summer job. I think I’m probably not the only one who feels exhausted in this heat, and writing up research is not the first thing that comes to mind after working for nine hours. 

I have listened interesting seminars/lectures about advertising for the research seminar- task of this course. What has especially caught my interest is eye tracking related to visual marketing communications. I actually remember Jenny telling me about eye tracking in our earlier research check up- meetings, but I somehow didn’t realize how I could actually integrate it to my work. What I’m about to do with my current work, is to include findings of the research seminar I viewed online into my work’s theory part and base some of my analysis on it. I'll probably also keep eye tracking in my mind for the near future thesis project.

Whenever I get my theory ready (seems like never) I will fully concentrate on analyzing visual imagery of companies’ marketing communications. It will be interesting to break the images down in separate features and then make conclusions on what these images have in common. 

Writing up this thing makes me wonder if there can ever be too many hours to actually be ready with this kind of work. I at least never seem happy with what I have previously written. Is it just me and my perfectionist nature talking? 

/Essi

Blog Entry 2. Internship at VIC Textiltvätt AB in Kållered!

Hi everyone,

Following from last weeks’ update, I will in this blog entry tell you about the ‘opportunity’ I mentioned last week.
VIC has 3 independent hand-in shops (Mölndal, Hisingen and Kungsbacka) excluded from the shop in the factory in Kållered.
VIC’s ambition is to be a modern dry-cleaning business and one step towards becoming that is to abandon loose hand-written paper work as much as possible. Getting rid of unnecessary hand-written paper work is not only a mere proof of modern thinking, it is also environmental.
After the system was implemented in the factory and I had been trained to master it, I was asked to teach out the new system to the employees in the independent hand-in shops.
This process will continue during the fall so up to this point I have at the moment only provided training in the system for one of the shops, the one at Hisingen.
The IT guy and I went out to the shop and had everything installed and in place so I could start teach our employee.

The IT guy finishing the set-up of the new system at the shop in Hisingen.

The new system, computer and a tag printer.

The hand-in shop at Hisingen.

The new system consists of a laptop, so when customers comes in and hand in their laundry, the employee will in the new system fill in the customer’s name, phone number and what the customer have handed in as well as the delivery date. Once this is done, the employee prints a receipt for both the customer and him/herself, then tags/labels with a five unique digit number are printed which are used to mark the laundry so when the laundry is delivered back from the factory, it can be matched with the receipt that the customer has and identified with the receipt that the employee printed when the customer handed the laundry in.

I think the system is great! One of the major advantages with digitalizing the business it is that if you lose the printed receipt, you can still print out a new one, when the clothes arrives from the factory, you can just check the marking and then print out a new receipt.
This was not as easy with hand written receipts.

The new system also allows the employee to make invoices which are then sent to the factory where the owner of the company (my stepdad) takes care of the rest.

When I am there, I like to arrange the customers’ laundry in color scales and the like, if possible 😊

Besides from teaching out the new system, I have also worked with some administrative tasks in the factory.
VIC receives ‘skador’ (‘Damages’) on a daily basis which are laundry/dry-cleaning items from insurance companies. If there’s been a fire in a house, the insurance company can take all the clothes, and send them to VIC where we have a look at what can be dry-cleaned and washed.
The sizes of these ‘skador* varies, sometimes it can be one refuse sack and sometimes 40.
Each ‘skada’ receives a unique number when they have arrived to VIC and once it has been recorded, washed and packed, we place them in the large store room.
VIC wants to keep track of what is finished, when it is finished and where it is standing n the store room to just mention a few information of interest.
That’s where I come in, I have sometimes helped out creating this information in excel.
 

So overall, teaching other employees a new system requires more time than we might think. Also, the preparational stages can take time as well.
I’m happy though that I was given the chance to help out with this task and I’m looking forward to teach out our other employees’ at the other shops the new system.

Next week I will let you know what I have been learning from this internship and what I’ve been up to since this post.

/ Emma

Blog Entry 1. Internship at VIC Textiltvätt AB in Kållered!

Hi everyone,
My name is Emma and I am at the moment doing my internship at Vic Textiltvätt AB.
VIC is a family owned dry-cleaning and laundry business that puts a lot of focus and efforts into the aspects of washing but also finding environmentally and sustainable solutions. The company was founded in 1964. VIC has an impressive customer base, with some of their major clients including hotels, food chains and fashion clothing stores to just mention a few.
So, VIC wash, clean and dry-clean for both private customers and companies from all over the Gothenburg region.

When I started my internship, I was given the responsibility to manage an order of about 8000 pieces of shirts from ICA.
My duties included unpacking all the shirts, removing the price tag and organize them in accordance with their size (then save for later to re-tag each shirt), ensure that the shirts were washed properly or ozone treated depending on the condition of the shirts, then when dried, putting the price tag back on, then pack all the shirts down in boxes, making them ready to be delivered.
Orders like this one, is interesting and may seem quite easy at a first glance. However, in reality, it is quite much work, as it requires you to think about small details, details that in the end can make a difference in how long it takes for you to have all the shirts ready for delivery.
Because in the end, the customer (in this case it was ICA) often wants delivery as soon as possible. ICA knew of course from when VIC received the shirts, that it wouldn’t be possible to have all the 8000 shirts cleaned and ready in a week.
Whenever I work with an order (or school project as well for that matter) I tend to always start off by visualising or mind-mapping the whole process, so I can better get an overview of what needs to be done.
For this order I knew that the sizes were marked on each box and from here I could start to unpack the sizes in the ranges from S-4XL in a chronological order. This makes sense, because if all shirts with size ‘Small’ are washed together and dried together, it will be easier for me to put the price tag back on and pack them down into boxes, rather than having to go back and forth because shirts and sizes are mixed.

This is the factory where the magic happens.

Process of price tagging and wrapping the shirts plastic before packing them down into boxes and making them ready for delivery.



Another picture of the process.




All 8000’s shirts ended with 6 pallets.

I really enjoyed working with the shirts, even though the monotonic aspects attached to it, you learn a lot about how to plan and manage your time and resources, but also to think and be a step ahead.

During this time, I was also trained in the new system for when laundry comes in to the factory (either from one of the 3 hand-in laundry shops, the shop at the factory, or from the delivery cars).
When laundry comes in to VIC, usually we use a pink paper (like the one seen below) which serves as the receipt for what laundry the customer has handed in to us. We also keep a copy of the receipt. Each receipt has a unique four-digit number and tags which we mark the laundry with so we can ensure that the customer is given back what he/she has handed in.
VIC being a modern business, wanted to instead have all this information digitally as it would facilitate the everyday tasks which requires sometimes the price or delivery date to be altered. Another benefit of the digital system is that it is easier to keep customer’s information updated, and we don’t have to ask them each time their name and phone number as it is in the system.

The receipt from the new system also calculates the price and discounts (if applicable). An example of the new system receipt can be seen below.

The receipt VIC used to have.

The receipt from the new system.

During this same time period I was informed that I would be given an opportunity that included their shops (especially one of them which is located in Hisingen).
I will tell you more about this next week.

/ Emma

Arriving at KappAhl

My first weeks at KappAhl’s womenswear department have filled me with plenty of new impressions. Although my studies and previous work experience of course have prepared me well for the corporate fashion world, I feel that it is this internship that finally puts all pieces together. That “Oh, I see; that’s how it works!” is truly a great feeling! I’m sure that many of you feel the same in your internships.

The objective of my internship is to gain understanding of the buying function within a large apparel firm. It’s interesting to see how large companies are organized! Here, the structure looks similar across departments, which makes it easy to help out for different concepts and collections. In an enormous work space with an open landscape configuration, communication travels freely in all directions among designers, design assistants, buyers, buying assistants, garment technicians, business controllers, managers and directors. There are pieces of clothing everywhere. Fabric and garment samples, lab dips, strike-offs and details keep coming in with a steady flow from suppliers. There are fittings not only on mannequins but also on real fit models. Here, you breathe creativity and inspiration!

Three major “first impressions”:

1. How creative the buying position can be! I was surprised to discover to what degree a buyer/buying assistant actually engages in product development. At least at KappAhl, you work in cross-functional teams with lots of room for creativity! You work with fabrics, colors, trends, trims and accessories, developing silhouettes and styles, creating commercial clothes. Personally, I wonder: can it be more fun?
2. The wonderful corporate culture. I see high professionalism, huge competence and wonderful colleagues who are very kind, helpful and have fun working together. It is obvious that KappAhl is a nice and healthy workplace.
3. Impressive structure. The well-developed organizational structure enables you to focus on your link in the textile value chain whilst operating with several different parts of the organization: production offices, merchandising, marketing, logistics, finance, sourcing, procurement, press etc. This web-like structure makes work run smoothly and you get lots of support from others. Also, it contributes to an interesting and highly stimulating work environment!

Analyzing - post 3

Hey again, 

Its amazing weather in Borås which makes it hard to stay inside and analyze my empirical material instead of being outside and get a tan. Hence the good weather I actually HAVE stared to analyze my empirical material and it didn’t actually turned out the way I thought it would. 

For my study, Brainforest and I came up with a hypothesis that I with eye tracking tests followed by a shorter interview. Before I stared the tests I was pretty sure that I would get more information from the eye tracking tests than the interviews. But I had wrong, and to analyze the eye tracking tests is not as easy as I first thought. BUT I will have a result and thats want counts right. 

Below, I’ve attached a sample from my test in Handelslabbet with the eye tracking equipment. The tests consisted of 6 pictures that the test person got to see for 5 sec each. What you can see is one of the pictures with a heat map of where the person looked. The green shows where the person has looked and the more yellow/red it is, the more focus has been put into it. 

I hope you all have an amazing summer and I can’t wait to see what you all have come up to!

Best regards, Josefin

The final stretch at NA-KD

Hi again!

This week is the second last week of my internship at NA-KD. Time really flies by so quickly when you have so many things to do at your internship!

Since this is also my last post here, I’d like to summarize what I’ve done during my 5 months internship here at NA-KD HQ in Gothenburg.

Research
I helped in finding potential influencers around the world for possible design collaborations. So my task is more or less the first screening round of the entire process. Moreover, since the collaboration is one of the main marketing strategies of NA-KD, I also decided to conduct a research in this area.

my new best friend

Copywriting
I helped to create texts used in various campaigns at NA-KD and I have to say that I really enjoyed doing it :D Here, for example, you will see my copy texts that I wrote for the Galore x NA-KD campaign.

 you can click here to see the campaign!

Co-managing collab projects 
Starting with booking a hotel, a flight, to putting together a presentation, I’ve got to know the process of doing a project here. This has helped me to be more organized, structured, and improve my interpersonal skill.

Iva Nikolina x NA-KD is one of the projects that I involved intensively. I help to look for shooting locations in LA,  write copy for website and newsletter, and many more.

Co-managing events
As you might already know from my previous posts, I helped to make sure that events running smoothly :D So I dealt with searching sponsors, ordering blow-ups and other decorations for the event, as well as following up with external companies.

NA-KD event at Breuninger Department Store -- Düsseldorf, Germany

Sending clothes to celebrities and influencers 
How fun it was to choose clothes to send to Rihanna or Kylie Jenner? The answer is: very fun! ;)

pick and pack

Annnnd everything here and there!

Last but not least, I’ll have to end my post here. This has been a wonderful internship experience and I’m sure I’ll miss all of my lovely colleagues here at NA-KD. If you seek a fast-growing place where you get to do various things, where your managing skill will improve drastically, and where you can see your ideas and opinions come to life, I’d say NA-KD is a place you should definitely go for.

I hope you enjoy reading about my little journey. Until next time! xoxo

Percentage presentation

Hey everyone, 

Last time I published here I told you that I am doing a research project about discount communication and eye tracking together with a company called Brainforest. 

What I’ve been doing since you last heard from me is that I’ve been working on my frame of reference and I’ve also eye tracking tests together with Handelslabbet. What I’ve been looking further into is how we present discount rates in discount communication and the purpose for my study is: 

”How big impact has the percentage marks’ presentation in discount communication, in relationship to the actual discount rate?”

As I told you above, I’ve done eye tracking tests followed by a shorter interview to get a better understanding in how we perceive and interpret discount communication. The test was very funny and interesting and I believe that I will come up with very interesting results when I now start to analyze my empirical material. 

// Josefin 

Hello 3

Hello again for the last time. My internship period ended a while back and while i’m finishing up my report, it’s time to reflect a bit. 

To me, the internship, together with simultaneously conducted research and reading on my chosen topic of content marketing and previous experience from the industry is a valuable combination that helped to see matters of the industry a bit in a new perspective. Combining the very recent experience and knowledge form previous courses and immediately utilizing them on the field helped me learn even more. 

Now, the final thing is to finish up the report before i can enjoy the extremely rare and warm Estonian summer. Last time it was this warm, the year was 1961. 

Goodbye and have a great summer. 

What is it that makes people run their craft?

Hello Everyone ! 

After conducting, three enriching interviews with organizations associated with IKEA for the Social Entrepreneurship project, currently, for the relative study, I am going through the book Transforming Tradition- A method for maintaining tradition in a craft and design context by Adhi Nugraha.

Points are scattered on the pages …. Tradition, communal values, contentment... But then if seen in collaborations such as IKEA is having, there is another aspect as to what is exactly the value of preserving tradition through collaboration? Knowledge.. !

Craft is embedded in skills and knowledge which continues through generations. It’s a human impulse where the desire to do the work is for its own purpose. Where in today’s times, the organisation taps on in the right place and the right people to showcase the same crafted product to the world. It now provides livelihood but also carefully outlines cultural identities.

Image Source – (https://www.ikea.com/ms/ms_MY/pdf/product_press_kits/2017/FULLVIKTIG_HIGHRES.pdf)

 The FULLVIKTIG collection from IKEA with the Mae Fah Luang Foundation, Thailand highlights the various process of elements in the design process, which forms a part of the unique code, each crafted product weighs.

An interesting point is that ‘The crafted object communicates through a social code.’ (Nugraha. A, 2012) The code is unique as well as diverse, a form of impression that entails ideologies. The ideologies are a source of exchange in design portrayal, creativity and cultural diversity, which are the essential elements of the organisation. In this way, a global organisation tries to keep a common heritage.

It is where people can learn abundantly from the wisdom of the knowledge that is already at the artisan stage, but also now spreads in the value chain of the buyer and supplier organisations. The other aspect is that knowledge over here also highlights the thoughts of the artisans portrayed effectively through the products, since people also require meaning and tradition. Thus, the dissemination of knowledge, through all the stages preserves the reigns of the craft!

References:

Adhi Nugraha (2012) ‘Transforming Tradition- A method for maintaining tradition in a craft and design context’, Aalto University publication, Finland