Fashion merchandisers can be found doing design, retail and home decorating. They also manufacture and market apparel. Additionally, they design showroom and window displays. A good Fashion Merchandiser will be familiar with the various Business Functions in the fashion industry as well as up on the latest trends, and much of this knowledge is gained while attending fashion merchandising colleges, fashion merchandising schools, and/or fashion merchandising universities. Merchandising is a Promotional Art, but moving the products from raw textiles to the Retail Market requires selling skills along with a firm understanding of the mathematics of business, visual merchandising and retail functions.
Fashion Merchandising is an art in that a major component of the profession is display and effective visual merchandising. However the display aspects of the job follow retail buying, retail management and merchandising as the order of tasks involved. Careers in Fashion Merchandising requires business administration first and foremost; as such Retail Planning is perhaps the most important skill.
