WGSN is a
trend forecasting company with offices in
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
,
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
New York may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* ...
,
Hong Kong
Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
and
São Paulo
São Paulo (; ; Portuguese for 'Paul the Apostle, Saint Paul') is the capital of the São Paulo (state), state of São Paulo, as well as the List of cities in Brazil by population, most populous city in Brazil, the List of largest cities in the ...
. It supplies global brands with consumer and product design
forecasts
Forecasting is the process of making predictions based on past and present data. Later these can be compared with what actually happens. For example, a company might estimate their revenue in the next year, then compare it against the actual resu ...
and provides business and marketing consultancy to clients.
History
WGSN was founded in 1998 in
West London
West London is the western part of London, England, north of the River Thames, west of the City of London, and extending to the Greater London boundary.
The term is used to differentiate the area from the other parts of London: Central London, N ...
by brothers Julian and
Marc Worth
Marcus Daniel Worth (March 1961 – 13 January 2023) was a British businessman. He was the co-founder of WGSN (trend forecasting), Worth Global Style Network, a fashion trend-forecaster, and Stylus.
Early life
Marcus Daniel Worth was born in M ...
. In October 2005, it was purchased by Emap (now
Ascential
Ascential (formerly EMAP) was a British-headquartered global company, specialising in events, intelligence and advisory services for the marketing and financial technology industries. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange until it was acq ...
), a
business-to-business
Business-to-business (B2B or, in some countries, BtoB) refers to trade and commercial activity where a business sees other businesses as its customer base. This typically occurs when:
* A business sources materials for its production process for ...
publisher and exhibitions company, for £140m.
In 2013, the firm merged with its biggest competitor, Stylesight. Like WGSN, Stylesight had a vast library of
fashion forecasting
Fashion forecasting began in France during the reign of Louis XIV. It started as a way of communicating about fashion and slowly transformed into a way to become ahead of the times in the fashion industry. Fashion forecasting predicts the moods of ...
, trend information, archival photos, and even sketches and patterns for
designers
A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exper ...
to use. Keeping the WGSN name, the new product has been designed around the technology developed by Stylesight and launched in 2014.
In November 2017, the company bought Use Fashion (now ''Start by WGSN''), a regional competitor in
Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
, launching its secondary business focused on fashion entrepreneurs.
In 2024, WGSN announced an agreement between Apax Partners, a global private equity advisory firm, and Ascential for the acquisition of WGSN for £700m. The transaction was completed in February of the same year.
Products
As an online service, the business derives its
revenue
In accounting, revenue is the total amount of income generated by the sale of product (business), goods and services related to the primary operations of a business.
Commercial revenue may also be referred to as sales or as turnover. Some compan ...
s from 9 different product
subscription
The subscription business model is a business model in which a customer must pay a recurring price at regular intervals for access to a product or service. The model was pioneered by publishers of books and periodicals in the 17th century. It ...
s (WGSN Insight, WGSN Fashion, WGSN Interiors, WGSN Beauty, WGSN Food & Drink, WGSN Consumer Tech, WGSN Barometer, Coloro, TrendCurve+) and a custom advisory business (WGSN Mindset).
See also
*
Coolhunting
Coolhunting is a neologism coined in the early 1990s referring to a new kind of marketing where professionals make observations and predictions based on changes of new or existing "cool" cultural fads and trends. Coolhunting is also referred to ...
*
Extrapolation
In mathematics
Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. ...
*
Technology forecasting
Technology forecasting attempts to predict the future characteristics of useful technological machines, procedures or wikt:technique, techniques. Researchers create technology forecasts based on past experience and current technological developmen ...
*Trend Forecasting
References
External links
*
Ascential
Forecasting
Companies based in New York City
Cultural trends
Market research organizations
Street fashion
2024 mergers and acquisitions
Apax Partners companies
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