Kate Winslet putting up an umbrella in the rain. Aimee Lou Wood and Micheal Ward lying, gazing at one another on a checked blanket in the park. Naomi Campbell sitting in a cab next to a knight. The latest instalment of Burberry’s “It’s always Burberry weather” serves up British celebrities and playful tropes by the bucket. But can it unlock the brand’s turnaround?
Burberry is under pressure to quickly get back on track after almost a decade of lukewarm performance. This week, the brand revealed that its revenue for the year ended 31 March 2025 fell 15 per cent to £2.46 billion, with adjusting operating profit tumbling 88 per cent year-on-year to £26 million.
CEO Joshua Schulman (who joined in July 2024) unveiled his turnaround strategy — ‘Burberry Forward’ — in November. It involved a return to the heritage brand’s foundations, including a new pricing architecture that is more elevated in categories like outerwear, where the brand has more authority; a shift away from modern Britishness to timeless Britishness; and better aligning chief creative officer Daniel Lee’s designs with merchandising and marketing to improve the visibility of classic brand signifiers. To help steer the marketing reset, Schulman has tapped Jonathan Kiman, previously chief of marketing at Gucci and Versace.
Marketing is one of the quickest — and most visible — elements of a brand refresh. “For Burberry specifically, marketing plays a big role in the turnaround because they’ve shifted the focus [of the brand]. When you do that, it’s important to communicate it,” says Jelena Sokolova, senior equity analyst at financial services firm Morningstar.
“This is a business with long lead times, so we’re able to impact marketing ahead of product, and the new product will roll in over time,” Schulman said during the company’s Q2 earnings call. Product will come next: Burberry has been aggressively clearing out its inventory pile-up over the past year (gross inventory was down 7 per cent at the close of fiscal 2025, ahead of guidance) — which has had a negative impact on profits, but frees Burberry up to push new product into the market in fiscal 2026, including more outerwear, scarves and items with brand signifiers like the Burberry check or knight.
This marketing-first approach comes with challenges: brand perception, engagement and reach may rise, but conversion could trail behind as the product plays catch-up. An over-reliance on marketing could also dilute the brand, and the investment could eat further into the bottom line.
Burberry delivered £24 million in savings in the second half of the fiscal year, with plans to strip out an additional £60 million in the next two years. The brand plans to lay off 1,700 staff across HQ, manufacturing and retail roles (just under a fifth of its workforce). By aggressively cutting back costs operationally and structurally, the company is able to “protect our investment in consumer-facing areas”, Schulman said. With “reigniting brand desire” as one of the key focuses in the year ahead, analysts expect marketing to be a key investment. (Burberry declined to comment on whether marketing spend would increase in FY26.)
“It seems to me that Burberry has been in cost-cutting mode for the past 10 years, so it didn’t seem that they were overburdened with extra costs — but they have identified more that they can cut. Marketing and brand investments are not something you want them to cut, because that’s something that drives appeal and revenue eventually,” says Sokolova. Sokolova, who rated Burberry’s stock as “undervalued”, says the refocus on products — where Burberry has the most authority (outerwear and scarves) — is encouraging.
What’s changed so far?
Experts question whether it was clear who the Burberry customer was in previous years. “In this sense, Burberry’s marketing campaigns are effective because they remind us what the brand is about — the British roots, the logo, the essence,” says Dafna Goor, assistant professor of marketing at London Business School.
Along with increasing the visibility of core product categories like outerwear, scarves and the Burberry check bikini in campaigns, the brand has also upped its representation of classic British signifiers — from London landmarks, to the English countryside, to iconic British stars (from Cara Delevingne to Olivia Colman). “By spotlighting long-standing stars who remain relevant as well as upcoming celebrities, Burberry reinforces a sense of timeless British identity and enduring cultural cachet,” says Goor. “There’s a subtle nod to intergenerational appeal: it feels modern enough for younger audiences while resonating with those who remember Burberry’s heyday. It’s Burberry’s way to reclaim cultural relevance.”
The tone of Burberry’s marketing has shifted since the implementation of the new strategy. In line with changes to the pricing architecture and the intentional rebalancing away from the overly fashion-forward customer back to the core consumer, Burberry’s marketing has arguably become more approachable and playful. The first shift was seen when Burberry launched its festive campaign, ‘Wrapped in Burberry’, intentionally “bringing back a uniquely warm and recognisable Burberry spirit”, Schulman said during his November strategy update. This same tone has been seen throughout both editions of the ‘It’s Always Burberry Weather’ campaign, the brand’s Lunar New Year campaign, and the more recent high summer campaign.
“They’re a bit more playful with it, but in the same breath their new approach is really tailored to their OG client,” says Callum McCaff, founder of Outlander Magazine, who has been following and analysing Burberry’s campaigns closely on his platform. “With the [Mother’s Day campaign] with Georgia May Jagger, I think that’s what the OG Burberry customer wants to see — maybe they’re people in London who have owned Burberry for a while now, they’re mothers now, they’re a family-oriented person who likes to take their dog on a walk around Hyde Park.” Burberry’s Met Gala looks were also strong, he adds.
Perhaps one of Burberry’s most successful campaigns in FY25 was ‘It’s Always Burberry Weather’, which launched prior to Schulman’s tenure but has since expanded under his leadership to include a second installation. During the Q3 earnings conference in January, he highlighted that the brand had seen positive customer growth during December for the first time in two years, which the CEO attributed to an increase in brand desirability. “It’s really the consistency of this messaging and the continued amplification of our storytelling,” he said at the time. Sokolova expects Burberry to continue refurbishing this campaign in the future, launching it with various talent and plots.
The challenge for Burberry is to balance the inviting tone — and price decreases in certain categories — with its brand positioning. “Heavy marketing investments like influencer partnerships, events and campaigns are used to create an association and remind us what the brand is about, but they can feel more mass market. If you rely too heavily on marketing, you risk diluting the brand — being perceived as too approachable,” says Goor.
Next steps
Burberry’s marketing strategy faces a tension between being consistent and speaking to the core customer versus risking predictability. The new strategy is focused on a return to basics, but that can only take you so far. “The problem is it doesn’t leave room for them to grow. If they’re returning back to what worked 10 years ago as their safety net, they might get stuck and not want to try anything new,” McCaff says. It’s also a risky game to play. “Everyone thinks Burberry was super strong 10 years ago, so they’re always going to compare it.”
The challenge, according to Goor, is whether Burberry’s campaigns can “evolve beyond visual impact to offer a sharper, more differentiated voice in the crowded luxury space”.
One way to do this is by giving full creative freedom to collaborators, so the ideas can come off as more fresh and unique, says McCaff. Burberry has been experimenting with artist collaborations — such as commissioning a series of paintings by Brooklyn-based artist Jack Kenna for Valentine’s Day 2025.
At the same time, McCaff believes Burberry would benefit from further consistency around its social content. “I’ve noticed with Burberry’s social media content, they do about 10 posts with the same content and then they change it up again. It’s not long enough to feel emotionally attached,” he says. “It’s like they’re throwing ideas at the wall to see what sticks. They need to be more confident, because the consumer can tell when the brand needs them and that can put them off.”
The brand has been particularly consistent with the ‘Burberry Portraits’ series (both in campaigns and on TikTok) — which have been well received. McCaff would like to see the Burberry knight brought back more consistently, too. “It was smart to make the Burberry knight a physical person. I think they should continue and really build a narrative around that,” he says, referencing the campaign shots with Campbell, as well as the knight’s presence on the front rows of Burberry’s shows.
There are also opportunities for Burberry to continue targeting the Asian market, particularly China where sales dropped 15 per cent year-on-year in 2025. Quarter-on-quarter, however, Sokolova says performance has been relatively flat for Burberry — neither improving nor deteriorating. “China is a very dynamic market in terms of local channels and social media, but I’ve noticed that brand desirability tends to be pretty homogenous — the brands doing the best in the West are also doing well in China,” she says, referencing Miu Miu and Hermès. A focus on sports and the outdoors seems to resonate with Chinese consumers, she observes, highlighting an opportunity for Burberry to lean into this in their China-focused marketing campaigns, along with continued use of locally relevant talent.
The next step for Burberry is to follow up the marketing with product updates, as Schulman outlines in his strategy. In this sense, Sokolova notes that marketing can’t be everything. “If you have a disconnect between what you’re marketing and what you’re offering, [that’s a problem]. You have to offer products people actually want to buy, you have to get the pricing right, the merchandising — marketing is not a silver bullet,” she says.
Changing the pricing architecture, merchandising and brand perception are “much slower processes than changing marketing”, continues Sokolova. “It’s important for investors to bear in mind that perception of the brand can take time to change — once a brand falls off your radar, maybe you see a campaign and check it out, but it takes time to shift your perception. In this sense, consistency is the key.”
Comments, questions or feedback? Email us at feedback@voguebusiness.com.
More from this author:
Burberry plans job cuts as profits slump
‘Our best days are ahead’: Burberry CEO reveals turnaround plan
