Fenomenale Ferragamo
A portfolio that has expanded far beyond an original offer based around the
Kenneth Cole watch brand, and an international presence gradually expanding out from its core territories in the USA are the hallmarks of success for New Jersey-based distributor World Tour Enterprises (WTE).
Founded in the 1990s, WTE concentrated for a some years on enhancing the global profile of the Kenneth Cole brand. In the early part of this decade, however, the focus began to expand with the addition of several new brands, namely surfers’ lifestyle line Freestyle, young sports enthusiast brand Xgames and Tommy Bahama.
Perhaps even more significantly, 2003 saw the launch of WTE’s own range of gift sets. Jean Marc combines stylish watches with wallets, pens and calculators for men, and jewellery for women, and continues to be a major driver of growth for WTE. As vice-president of sales and marketing, Roger Winton, tells Frontier: “This concept – marrying a watch with accessories for men and a watch with jewellery items for ladies – has been the fastest growing segment of the business over the past two years.”
In the last three years, the company has added two new watch brands – BCBG Max Azria and Betsey Johnson – and continued its mission to expand its reach beyond the Americas (where cruise lines
and key airports account for the majority of sales) to Europe, the Middle East and Asia. A long list of new listings in the last few years – among them Singapore Airlines, Saudi Arabian Airlines, Nuance-Watson HK, Maya Duty Free and Emerson Duty Free Canada – suggests that the hard work has paid off handsomely.
In particular, Asia – where the company has been working with the long-established Jonathan Holland and Associates as its sales agent for the region since last August – is likely to be a crucial part of
WTE’s strategy going forward. “The focus will be on expanding the base in Asia, where we forecast a doubling of sales over the next two years,” says Winton. “This will be achieved by regular visits and a monthly in-depth analysis on sales with each account to derive trends and to supply visual images of
models sold with a view to facilitate reordering into key items.”
Northern and Central Europe – where WTE has been active for the last two-and-a-half years – are also coming in for further attention. In these territories, it has been Kenneth Cole leading the charge (particularly in inflight), and indeed this brand – which offers a range of style for consumers aged 20 upwards and is regularly refreshed with new collections to meet consumers’ ever-changing requirements – continues to provide a lead for WTE’s overall business.
Accordingly, Winton believes this line has a long and productive future ahead of it. “With the Kenneth Cole brand the principle goal is to be number one in the fashion/designer watch business at the unit level.”
Along with BCBG Max Azria, it is the Jean Marc brand that continues to expand its reach at the fastest rate. Complemented by the recent addition of new, transparent presentation boxes, the range now covers 27 current styles and has, in the past year, been introduced into Europe and Asia.
“The sets reflect the ever-changing desires of the passenger, whereby price is an issue and repeat passengers wish to return with something different than T-shirts or confections,” says Winton of a brand that is performing well with retail partners including Starboard Cruise Services and Harding Bros, and is
expected to register 40% further growth in 2007 when compared to last year.
It is an impressive picture, surely attributable in part to WTE’s full comprehension of the wider trends in the global watches category. Well aware of the growth in recent years in the fashion/designer segment, Winton highlights the emergence of more affordable automatic watches (being “sought after by the rural Chinese traveller” who has limited access to repair centres) and technologically-advanced timepieces as the most influential developments.
To that should be added the demand for “watches that feature Swiss attributes but at affordable price points – they have steadily increased in market share, and this dovetails to watches becoming a stronger gift purchase. Customers are becoming used to a wardrobe of watches but want quality and value. It is not uncommon for customers to own five or six watches, and add annually to their collections. Chronographs continue their strong growth, and within the fashion/designer ranges maintain a high ranking.”
With a keen eye for the latest trends and a broadly-based portfolio to back up its aspirations, WTE is well-positioned for further development this year – indeed the company is projecting a “much larger overall growth” figure for 2007 than its already impressive 35% statistic for last year. Tantalisingly, Winton hints that possible “additional concepts” – likely to be revealed in the near-future – could “result in a doubling of growth patterns over the next three years”.
Now 37 members of staff, World Tour Enterprises is clearly a player with a plan, so you would be advised to watch this space as the company continues to hone its approach towards an evermore dynamic category.
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