Weekly Key Trends Report Shaping The Industry
February 23, 2026 – March 1, 2026
Here’s what’s shaping the industry this week:
1. Milan Fashion Week Delivered The Debuts Everyone Was Watching. Results Were Mixed.
Three debuts defined the week: Chiuri at Fendi (wearable, commercial, safe), Rogge at Marni (a genuine reset back to the brand’s art-world roots), and Demna at Gucci. Demna’s pre-show AI-generated campaign landed badly. Not because of the technology, but because it felt like unauthentic. Great brands don’t substitute fabricated worlds for real ones. Prada remained the anchor of the calendar. Paris opens March 2. Anderson’s 2nd Dior show is the next real signal.
2. eBay Is Buying Depop For $1.2 Billion. Resale Just Got Serious Infrastructure.
Etsy sold Depop to eBay for $1.2B, $400M less than it paid in 2021. Etsy is refocusing on its core marketplace. eBay gets 7 million active buyers, 90% under 34, and $1B in annual GMV. Depop keeps its brand and platform. For premium brands, the takeaway is simple: your product is already being bought and sold on resale whether you’re involved or not. That secondary pricing shapes how your customer values your primary price. Brands that treat resale as a brand strategy are ahead of the ones still treating it as a footnote.
3. The EU Just Made It Easier For Brands To Avoid Reporting On Their Supply Chains. Don’t Get Too Comfortable.
The EU planned to enforce strict rules forcing companies to report on their environmental and social impact (proving they aren’t using forced labor or harming the environment in supply chains). However, they recently changed their minds and vastly watered down these rules. Now, only giant companies (1,000+ employees/€450 million+ in revenue) have to do this mandatory reporting. This means ~80% of the companies that were going to be forced to report are now off the hook. While companies are breathing a sigh of relief, the EU still warns them not to get too comfortable.
4. Puma’s Full-Year Results Are A Useful Reminder About What Discount Distribution Actually Costs.
Puma released FY2025 results on 3/26. Revenue down across every market and every category. Footwear -7.1%. Apparel -9.7%. Americas -10%. Q4 wholesale dropped 27.7% as the company cleared excess inventory from channels. 2026 is a declared transition year. Return to growth not expected until 2027. New CEO Hoeld’s diagnosis: Puma got “too commercial, overexposed in the wrong channels, with too many discounts.” The fix is the standard playbook: cut wholesale exposure, rebuild DTC, narrow the SKU count. By the time you see it in the P&L, the brand damage is already done.
Big week. Creative leadership questions at the top of the market. Resale consolidating fast. EU compliance pressure shifting from regulatory to commercial. And Puma’s numbers spelling out in plain terms what happens when distribution runs ahead of brand.
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