It is my pleasure to introduce our guest critic for Analyzing Trends 2010, Jasmine Takanikos. Jasmine will be sharing some of her work with the class and explain how she integrates trends into the strategic planning process. She will also be working with students on a trend field research assignment in which the class will go out and uncover trend themes in neighborhoods in New York City. She will join me in critiquing these projects later in early March. We will be sharing some of the highlights of the student work here. In the meantime check out her blog here.
For Jasmine Takanikos trends are constructed from concrete and abstract insights that together create a formula for cultural influence and market shifts. Her process of analyzing trends begins with her approach, as most run; she walks through the world, absorbing the fine print. Everything in her world is inter-connected, each person and product she comes across fit into a box. Information is categorized and her life becomes the blue print to help her brands and clients cross into uncharted territory. Takanikos has 10 years of experience working in various positions in the Fashion Industry: Retail, Wholesale, Buying, Development, Branding, Strategy, & Forecasting- throughout her years she has developed a fine tuned skill for taking these boxes and creating a web of knowledge. For brands, it’s about living with the consumer and becoming a part of their daily life. Forecasting comes down to being connected to the core, in efforts to gain purchase power loyalty. Thus a trend is born when a brand or a social theme starts to live within several individuals. The movement and energy behind it starts to gain momentum and context. The visual world of the trend begins to form.
Takanikos’ curiosity has pushed her to engage with participants from youth lifestyle brands and the professionals who lead these market trends. She has an authentic desire to understand how people really live behind the glitz and glam marketers often associate within these niche fashion audiences. As an active conversationalist herself, she has put herself in a position to react to brand messaging and engage the target consumer in authentic dialogue (ethnographic research) surrounding a brands messaging. She has always been one to operate outside the confines of presumptuous labels by continually evaluating all relevant both hearsay and historical data before engaging in a client project.
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