Latest News & Analysis – Page 219

  • Article

    Reima expands internationally

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Reima, the Finnish brand of children's outdoor apparel, is planning to launch its product range in the U.S., working through selected retailers, with deliveries starting in August 2017. The company is about to sign a distribution agreement with a local distributor and will be exhibiting for the first time at the ...

  • Article

    Asolo goes direct in Germany and the U.K.

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    The German media have already reported about Asolo's takeover of the distribution of its products in Germany. It took effect last April after the Italian footwear company found an experienced manager, Herbert Buczek, to run the new operation out of the MOC permanent showroom center in Munich.Buckzek, 48, has some ...

  • Article

    Mammut backs more international investments

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    The Mammut Sports Group is preparing increased investment in its international organization and marketing, as part of a five-year strategic plan backed by Conzzeta, the Swiss company that controls the outdoor brand.While providing few specifics at a presentation in Friedrichshafen, Mammut managers said that they were budgeting over-proportional expansion in ...

  • Article

    Icebreaker adjusts European distribution

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    After adjustments to its European organization that strongly pushed up sales and profits last year, Icebreaker continues to tweak its distribution, with four more changes implemented or coming up in European markets.The rejigging of the European structure started after the arrival of Peter Ottervanger as general manager two years ago, ...

  • Article

    Opinel goes to the U.S.

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Opinel, the French family-owned producer of an iconic pocket knife exhibited at New York's Museum of Modern Arts, has set up a one-man sales office for the U.S. market in Chicago, and it will exhibit for the first time at the Outdoor Retailer show in Salt Lake City next month. ...

  • Article

    Hydro Flask up 183%

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Like some other media, we incorrectly reported in the last issue that Hydro Flask's sales went up by “only” 22 percent in the first quarter of this year. To be precise, the company's new owners, Helen of Troy, said that Hydro Flask's growth in the first quarter was 22 percent ...

  • Article

    Gore-Tex supports growth at Montane

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Montane has obtained more shelf space with several key accounts in the last weeks as it launched a range of winter products with Gore-Tex membranes. The partnership is supporting a sustained sales increase for the British outdoor brand, which reached an annual average of about 20 percent in the last ...

  • Article

    Plenty of innovation at the OutDoor show

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Aside from a growing “urban outdoor” lifestyle trend, innovation was singled out as a key driver of growth in a market that is not expanding as fast as before, at the press conference that kicked off the OutDoor show in Friedrichshafen last week. Stefan Glowacz, the chief executive of Red ...

  • Article

    Scandinavian hammock and knives get prizes

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    In our last issue, we highlighted the strong development of camping hammocks in the U.S., which is apparently coming now also to Europe. Amok Equipment (sic), a young Norwegian brand of camping hammocks, won the overall Scandinavian Outdoor Group (SOG) Award 2016 for its particularly versatile Draumr 3.0 hammock.Without having ...

  • Article

    SpinDye: a new high-end fabric producer arrives on the market

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    At the OutDoor show in Friedrichshafen, a new specialty company for high-end dyeing came to the market with some well-known customers. The company, SpinDye, was founded only two years ago by an interesting combination of Swedish and Taiwanese business people.George Yang, one of the shareholders, has some 40 years of ...

  • Article

    Lifesaver, a new supplier of water filtering systems

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    A British producer of “ultrafiltration” bottles and filters, called Lifesaver, exhibited at the OutDoor show for the first time last week to find distributors and retailers in the outdoor sector. It is entering the sector with new products for the camping and hiking markets a few months after the brand, ...

  • Article

    Greenpeace takes issue with PFCs in the stores

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Greenpeace says it found concentrations of “hazardous” poly-fluorinated chemicals (PFCs) in the air of a few European outdoor stores that were 20 to 60 times higher than concentrations found in the organization's office and storage space in Hamburg, and up to 1,000 times higher than in urban outdoor air.Samples were ...

  • Article

    Vaude makes Detox commitment

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Vaude has been moving toward its target of making its entire apparel range without poly-fluorinated chemicals (PFCs) faster than expected and decided to become part of Greenpeace's Detox campaign, aiming to phase out the use and release of toxic chemicals in its entire supply chain by 2020.Rotauf, an apparel brand ...

  • Article

    Support for wool standard at outdoor fair

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    Textile Exchange obtained support in the European outdoor industry as it launched the Responsible Wool Standard (RWS) at the OutDoor fair, predicting that products using the standard could already be in the market by the second half of next year.The RWS was developed by the Textile Exchange with extensive input ...

  • Article

    Mr Deuter gets OutDoor Honor Award

    2016-07-20T00:00:00Z

    The German author Michael Pause distinctly recalls the day when he attended a conference with Bernd Kullmann, and Deuter Sport's then chief executive described the German company as the largest European supplier of backpacks. After the presentation, Pause turned to his friend and asked who was the largest global brand ...

  • Article

    Helly Hansen cuts back to expand sustainably

    2016-07-11T00:00:00Z

    Helly Hansen has trimmed its product range, cut back its distribution, rejigged its management and improved its capital structure, to get started on a four-year sustainable expansion strategy led by Paul Stoneham, who became its chief executive in February 2015.The Norwegian group reported operating revenues of 2,567 million Norwegian kroner (€272.3m-$300.9m) ...

  • Article

    Pabst to take over Mammut leadership

    2016-07-11T00:00:00Z

    Oliver Pabst, who spent nine years at Willy Bogner as executive board member in charge of sales and marketing, will be taking over from the start of September as chief executive of Mammut Sports Group. The Swiss outdoor company announced in May that Rolf Schmid would be leaving the company ...

  • Article

    Bergans reinforces international management

    2016-07-11T00:00:00Z

    Bergans is reinforcing its international management with the appointment of two prominent executives to lead sales and marketing at the Norwegian company, which has been headed up formally since December by Leif Holst-Liæker. Bergans makes about 65 percent of its turnover in Norway, with Sweden and Germany as other large ...

  • Article

    New managers for Merrell and Royer

    2016-07-11T00:00:00Z

    Rob Griffiths, 51, has been appointed by Wolverine Worldwide as the new general manager of Merrell for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). After working for Stylo Instep, Ellesse, Umbro, Bench and Esprit, Griffiths joined Wolverine at the end of 2013 as vice president and general manager of its ...

  • Article

    Pentland thrives

    2016-07-11T00:00:00Z

    The Pentland Group saw its sales advance by 10 percent to £2.4 billion (€2.8m-$3.1m) in 2015, driven by the outstanding performance of JD Sports Fashion, the European retail group in which it owns a 57 percent stake.The Retail Division of the Pentland Group, comprising JD Sports Fashion, raised its turnover ...