Outland Denim is set to focus on expanding its presence in physical stores.
Speaking with Ragtrader, Outland Denim CEO James Bartle said he is taking an “old school approach” as the company diversifies its focus from online trading.
“As much as online is really important, we believe there's going to be a resurgence into bricks and mortar retail shopping,” Bartle said.
“People desire to have that face-to-face interaction. And so we really want to invest into those moments as well with the brand.”
Outland Denim has around 50 stockists in Australia, as well as a presence in the USA through department store Nordstrom.
“When we're talking about a world being online for the last few years, I think there's a real hunger for people to come and engage in a physical presence," he said.
“Those sorts of things make sense to a brand like ours, with a powerful story and a strong message to communicate
“We’re really trying to build up more brand awareness to get more people coming in and asking in the right stores.
“We're still small, but it's one of those things where we want to be very strategic about who we bring on board from a stockist's standpoint.”
According to Bartle, Outland Denim was “wholesale heavy" at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“We had an online presence, but there was not a lot of investment going into it,” he said. “Then we obviously had to go for it as everything was going to revolve around online.
“Denim wasn't a category that was flying off the shelves during Covid-19 because people didn't want to wear denim when they were sitting at home - they'd prefer to buy a pair of trackpants.
“So, that was a little bit of a challenge. But we used that time to learn a lot more about our customer. And, coming out the other side, we're in the stronger position.
“We know who our customer is online, and we know some of their habits and what they're engaging us for - so now it's a matter of scaling those things up.”
Covid challenges and opportunities
With Covid-19 slowly easing its impact on supply chains, companies are noticing international shipping times dropping from months to weeks.
Bartle said while not fully recovered, there are improvements in key areas.
“There's a huge improvement from the time delays and pricing and all those things that we faced for the last nearly three years now.
“It is definitely going back to normal. Is it back to what it was? I don't think so. But it’s headed in the right direction.”
Bartle said the biggest challenge during the pandemic was lockdowns in Cambodia, which forced the company to shut down its factories for an intermittent six months over two years.
“That was a big hit on the business - having to pay staff to just sit at home - we couldn't be productive in any way.
“We couldn't produce whilst they were at home. We knew we were taking a hit; our wholesale business went from 100 to nothing.
“We really saw that as an opportunity to prove to ourselves whether we were really legitimate about what we say we're about.”
Bartle said the company used the time to upskill workers.
“And then redo and improve fits, improve washes, and just really focused on our product. It was a big financial hit for us, but we got to the other side of it.
“We’re now in a much stronger position as a result of being able to slow down and spend the time on those things.”
Looking forward, Bartle said the business is set to launch a textile waste solution by the end of 2022.
“We’ve been working for a number of years to try and develop a solution to textile waste,” said Bartle.
“Here in Australia, there's an estimated 800,000 tonnes a year making its way into landfill. Well, how do we use that to reduce the negative impact?
"How do we use textile waste to turn it into a good thing? We're really focused on that waste and the life part of the cycle.”