{"id":1200559,"date":"2023-03-17T14:39:53","date_gmt":"2023-03-17T19:39:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.snkrsday.com\/?p=1200559"},"modified":"2023-03-17T14:45:01","modified_gmt":"2023-03-17T19:45:01","slug":"vans-president-kevin-bailey-claims-the-brand-has-lost-its-edge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.snkrsday.com\/vans-president-kevin-bailey-claims-the-brand-has-lost-its-edge\/","title":{"rendered":"Vans President Kevin Bailey Claims The Brand Has Lost Its Edge Following a Decline in Sales"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
(Image via Vans\/Footwear News)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Vans<\/a><\/strong> is sneaker culture as much as it is streetwear, surf culture, skate style, and even California history. While contributing to many touch points amongst fashion and sport, Vans’ DNA is inherently unpretentious and has always been the sneaker of choice for misfits, outcasts, and rebels alike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a new interview with Footwear News<\/a><\/em>, Vans Global Brand President Kevin Bailey<\/strong> reveals that Vans is in a critical position as sales have declined and the brand has lost its grip on its image, as well as creative practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last month, Vans’ parent company, VF Corp., who also backs heavy-hitters like Supreme, Timberland, Dickies, and North Face, reported that Vans sales declined in Q3 2023, earning $926.9 million, which is a 13% decline from the year prior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n VF Corp also expects Vans\u00a0revenue to decline by high single digits in constant dollars, compared to the previous outlook of down mid-single digits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With a brand as tried and true as Vans, this decline in sales in certainly noticeable and has triggered the brand to take action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe brand is not broken,\u201d Bailey told Footwear News<\/a><\/em>. \u201cEverybody trips up once in a while. Skateboarders fall and cut their knees up. It is what it is. Have we hit a bump in the road? Yes. How much of this was our causing? Nearly all of it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bailey started working for Vans in 2002 and has been through many highs and lows with the brand, despite his on-and-off tenure with the company. Bailey returned to Vans almost a year ago in April 2022, and may have been handed-down circumstances more demanding than he imagined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the road ahead seems long, Bailey seems confident about Vans’ approach to remedy its recent shortcomings. Amongst other issues, Bailey believes that Vans has become too dependent on certain styles and that the brand is not creating enough newness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOur consumer said we want more style and versatility, but we kept pumping out Classics,” Bailey told Footwear News.<\/em> \u201cWhen I wasn\u2019t involved with Vans, I saw how much we spent on product development dwindle to places where no one spends that little.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bailey also feels that Vans’ brand image has taken a hit and lost its rebel-yell that Vans first stepped on the scene with in 1966.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We allowed ourselves to become too comfortable. We didn\u2019t maintain our edge. We lost our rebelliousness, that rebellious nature that is Vans. That \u2018eff you\u2019 attitude that is Vans. Somehow, we got watered down in the process.<\/p>\nKevin Bailey, Vans Global Brand President<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Vans’ recent safety-first approach has impacted more than just its creativity and brand image, but across all its different channels of distribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bailey continued confessing his frustrations, telling Footwear News<\/em>, \u201cWhen [chief product and merchandising officer] Marissa [Pardini] agreed to come back and help [in December 2022], the look in her eyes two weeks in was pretty similar to the look in my eyes, like, \u2018What the heck happened here? How did we lose some of our practices? How did we lose some of our disciplines? How are we this unfocused? How is our execution this poor?\u2019 The fact that we\u2019re still there is not a surprise to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Vans celebrates its 57th Anniversary in 2023 and will be spending the year ahead getting back to their roots as they work to reestablish prominence within the sneaker space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although Bailey and his team have identified their problems and created a plan of action, the president stresses that patience is key. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe time it takes to get well is serious,” said Bailey. “Turnarounds don\u2019t happen overnight. It\u2019s not what public companies want to hear, generally.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n He continued saying, \u201cI\u2019m convinced we have the right elements in play to change the way we show up by the second half of this year. But we\u2019re not going to be all the way to where we want it to be. We\u2019re still going through a tough cycle.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Moving forward, Vans is in good hands as Bailey will be leading trusted new-hires in the executive space: Marissa Pardini as Chief Product and Merchandising Officer, Sarah Kleinman as VP and GM of global digital, and Bobby Goodwin as VP of DTC merchandising for the Americas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Vans team plans to get more selective with SKUs during the upcoming year and will be getting rid of models that aren’t flying off the shelves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cRetail stores will have 30% to 40% fewer SKUs in the fall on the footwear wall, which will allow for a greater focus and greater understanding of the stories we\u2019re telling,\u201d Bailey said. \u201cThat drove an 11% increase in sales when we did a test in one store, just by taking models off the wall.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The team will also put an emphasis on storytelling, which is typically expressed through Vault by Vans<\/a> collections and collabs like the recent Joe Freshgoods<\/a> and Deaton Chris Anthony<\/a> packs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Vans hopes to bring awareness to new models and series like the MTE offerings<\/a> and the Vans UltraRange product line<\/a>, which have not caught on with consumers just yet. Footwear News<\/em> reported that awareness of the Vans UltraRange product line was around 10% among all consumers and below 30% among brand loyalists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Retail plays a major part in Vans’ success and will also be receiving an overhaul all its own. Vans will be reimagining its stores, which Bailey believes have also lost their appeal. The upcoming changes look to take on a more modern approach that rearranges the offerings by lifestyle, rather than gender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cToday, because our footwear and apparel teams haven\u2019t worked well in the past, they don\u2019t even feel like the same spaces on some level. We also have the men\u2019s side and women\u2019s side. We\u2019re talking more about style fluidity. Our young consumers dress the way they want to dress, that\u2019s how they express themselves,\u201d Bailey explained. \u201cIf you go to our website today and look at a men\u2019s pant and go through the images, you\u2019re going to find an image of a woman wearing the men\u2019s pant styled out. Why not? Consumers are doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He continued, \u201cSo why do we have a men\u2019s and women\u2019s side of the store? Why could we not think in terms of consumer category teams? Why could we not have a pro skate section, which has the skate shop for the hardgoods and our pro skate shoes and apparel? Why couldn\u2019t our lifestyle section have our core Classics and a bunch of basic tees and hoodies?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n In general, Vans to hopes to get reconnected with its consumer and understand their customer on a deeper level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201c[That] work has just kicked off,” said Bailey. “It\u2019s a study, a deep understanding of our consumers across demographics, geographies, activities, lifestyles.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For more sneaker news<\/a> and release dates<\/a>, follow @NiceKicks<\/a> on Instagram.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" (Image via Vans\/Footwear News) Vans is sneaker culture as much as it is streetwear, surf culture, skate style, and even…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":328355,"featured_media":1200560,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,1225488],"tags":[],"cultivate_rss":[],"class_list":{"2":"type-post"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n