Old firms, new tricks and the quest for profits: Burberry's journey from success to failure and back to success again

Abstract

Here, I scrutinize the recent efforts by the British firm Burberry to turn itself into a successful global luxury retailer from a number of angles, including those of marketing and cultural studies, as well as that of geography. I especially call attention to the apparent discrepancies between the manner in which the firm presents itself to its customers and the character of some of its recent profit making and upgrading strategies. Making use of three concepts from the literature—namely, the fetishism of the consumer, the fetishism of locality and competitive isomorphism—I then provide some critical insights into the internal workings of the firm; and, in the process, through the incorporation of ideas from marketing and cultural studies, contribute to the overall efforts by economic geographers to broaden the scope and reach of the field.