Re: Burberry had a Spring 2013 show last year . . .
That's how the fashion business works. In Summer you show your Autumn/Winter; In Winter you show your Spring/Summer for the next year.
This allows the company time to take orders, make the clothes and deliver them in time for the weather in which they were intended to be worn. For couture, this long lead is still needed, even if most of the fashion "brands" now use mass-production for most of their output...
I always thought Burberry was a good example of the danger facing Apple. An aspiration product that was ultimately damaged by its own success causing brand fatigue in their customers. I remember (around 2001-2002) when the world could not get enough of Burberry check. The same could be said of that Apple logo a couple of years ago. Then, as more and more "undesirable" (i.e., poor) people were seen wearing Burberry, it became something not be seen in at all in "polite" (i.e. rich) company. The "free iPhone" contracts are putting Apple's branding on that same trajectory in Europe at least, so they're well met.
Under Jobs, Apple was in effect a fashion house (I don't mean this disparagingly) - a large organisation that made and marketed the designs of one creative director (Jobs in this case). Now that he's dead, the company is struggling to recapture what it was that people loved about Jobs's work, just as fashion houses struggle when they lose their defining designers. Some find someone new and flourish (Chanel, Dior); others lose their way completely and wither (does anyone remember Callot?).
Interestingly, after Burberry ditched the visible check, they went back to concentrating on tailoring and quality, and have rebuilt a lot of the brand value that they lost, but it has taken years to undo the damage.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
