英国卫报：Gap是如何迷失自己的？(10)（在线收听）

　　Gap’s fall during the 00s and 10s stems from problems much bigger than hip-huggers.

　　Gap在00年代和10年代的衰落，原因不止低腰裤。

　　Chief among them is overexpansion.

　　其中最主要的是过度扩张。

　　In the 80s and 90s, Gap had piled up revenue by opening thousands of new stores.

　　在20世纪80年代和90年代，Gap通过开设数千家新店积累了收入。

　　This strategy was standard at the time.

　　这是当时的标准策略。

　　“The market demanded that you open more doors,” said Doug Stephens, a retail consultant based in Canada.

　　“市场要求你打开更多的大门，”加拿大零售业顾问道格·斯蒂芬斯说。

　　“It wasn’t even a choice that most companies had.

　　“这甚至不是大多数公司的选择。

　　In every earnings report, investors wanted to see how many new doors you had.”

　　在每一份收益报告中，投资者都想看看你有多少扇新门。”

　　By the early 00s, it was clear that Gap had gone too far.

　　到了20世纪初，Gap显然已经走得太远了。

　　(“The hardest thing for a brand to do is maintain what makes them special and yet sell to the entirety of the world,” said retail analyst Simeon Siegel, noting that Nike may be the only apparel retailer in the US currently managing that.)

　　零售业分析师西蒙·西格尔说：“对于一个品牌来说，最难做的事情就是保持自己的独特之处，同时又能卖到全世界。”他指出，耐克可能是目前美国唯一一家做到这一点的服装零售商。

　　For any brand of that size, it’s a challenge to train so many new staff and keep tabs on how stores were doing, while preventing newly opened stores from siphoning sales away from established locations.

　　对于任何这种规模的品牌来说，培训这么多新员工并密切关注门店的经营状况，同时防止新开门店抢走现有门店的销售额，都是一项挑战。

　　Could retailers like Gap have foreseen these problems?

　　像Gap这样的零售商能预见到这些问题吗？

　　Cohen believes so.

　　科恩认为可以预见。

　　“It was a train wreck that could be seen at the end of a long tunnel, but nobody was acting on it,” he told me.

　　就像在一条长长的隧道尽头可以看到的火车失事，但没有人采取行动，”他告诉我。

　　What they might not have been able to anticipate was the rise of e-commerce.

　　他们可能没有预料到的是电子商务的崛起。

　　As consumers have moved their shopping habits online in recent years, numerous once-mighty American department stores and popular mall brands have crumbled under the weight of their massive property portfolios – a problem that has only got worse during the pandemic.

　　近年来，随着消费者将购物习惯转移到网上，许多曾经强大的美国百货商店和受欢迎的购物中心品牌在其庞大的房地产投资组合的重压下崩溃了--这个问题在疫情期间只会变得更糟。

　　The British high street has undergone its own meltdown during Covid, with Topshop owner Arcadia Group entering administration and Marks & Spencer accelerating store closures.

　　在疫情期间，英国商业街也经历了自己的崩溃，Topshop的所有者阿卡迪亚集团进入破产管理程序，玛莎百货加速关闭门店。

　　Besides its excessive number of stores, Gap’s offering -- classic clothing for middle-class customers -- no longer fitted the moment.

　　除了门店数量过多外，Gap的产品--面向中产阶级的经典服装--已经不再适合那个时代。

　　As wealth inequality in the US grew, discount retailers TJ Maxx and Ross continued to prosper, and fast fashion brands like Forever 21, H&M and Zara drew away shoppers with their inexpensive, runway-inspired clothing.

　　随着美国财富不平等的加剧，折扣零售商TJ Maxx和Ross继续蓬勃发展，Forever 21、H&M和Zara等快速时尚品牌以其廉价、受秀台启发的服装风格吸引了购物者。

　　“I think that by the early 2000s, the writing was on the wall: if you’re a mid-tier brand looking for middle-class consumers, you’re going to have an increasingly difficult time,” said Stephens.

　　斯蒂芬斯说：“我认为，到21世纪初，形势已经很严峻：如果你是一个寻找中产阶级消费者的中端品牌，你的日子会越来越难过。”