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Industry :: p29
however, considered this to be false advertising,
and fined them.
“The ad campaign was right — what we did
wrong was to run it in the second year when
the situation had changed,” says Fuller.
In another incident a sales agent asked a
retail customer to remove the 20% discount
sign from Skins garments. Because they were
selling so fast, it was not necessary to offer
customers any enticement to buy. A competitor
reported Skins to the Australian Advertising
Authorities for price fixing.
“A lesson I learnt was that I was accountable,
no matter who did wrong. Legally, we did
make the statement, but it was a question of
intent. If I had said sorry, I’ll put a programme
in place for our sales staff to prevent this happening
in future, and offered to pay the difference
in sales price, I would have been fined
something like Aus$25 000 instead of $1-m.”
World brand
He wildly over-invested in the Australian media
campaign, Fuller freely admits. But, he needed
to build a brand and considered the Australian
market as a testing ground. “I thought that
if I’m investing in the Aussie market, I’m actually
investing in the world. If the model worked
there, I could take it anywhere.”
The campaign did set a solid platform for
launching a global brand. Skins’ international
headquarters moved to Switzerland, which not
only has a government that is inviting to and
understanding of international business, but
has a cosmopolitan culture and some of the
most spectacular scenery in the world, says
Fuller. Which makes it a pleasant place to live.
They also have offices in Australia, the UK,
US, France, Germany and China as well as 14
distributorships in other countries.
In 2010 they expanded East and partnered
with Li-Ning in China with a range of co-branded
products. “They had over 7 000 stores in
China, and it looked like a good opportunity,
but it became clear that the relationship was
never going to work because we represented
such a small percentage of their sales,” he
explains.
After a false start in South Africa — a bad
fit with the first distributor and a challenge to
their trademark registration, which the court
overturned with a ruling in Skins’ favour after
a 5-year delay — the brand has been distributed
locally by Super-Brands since 2012.
“I feel very comfortable with what they are
doing. These are great guys, they are really
good,” says Fuller. “I haven’t done a formal
analysis of numbers yet, but I believe we are
going to see really big growth for 2013 (in
South African sales).”
When selecting international distributors, he
believes it is very important to partner with
the right guys, who share their vision and not
only have an understanding of their own market,
but also understand the Skins brand identity
— “especially the humour and wit”. They
will also have to deliver on sales.
“My job is now to ensure that we maintain a
professional standard across the world. When
we sit down with retailers, we want them to
say we got to have Skins. When they only have
room for three brands, Skins must be one of
the three,” he says.
Sponsorships
The majority of UK Premier League clubs,
including Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal,
etc. had been playing in Skins for years,
without marketing contracts, but in 2006 they
launched the brand into the UK retail market,
which required bigger market exposure. Especially
when they moved into the US the following
year.
Subsequent sponsorship partnerships with
the Australian Rugby Union, Australian soccer,
Cycling Australia, USA Cycling, PGA UK, Rory
McIlroy, cycling’s Team Europcar, the International
Triathlon Union, NSW Athletics, Netball
NSW, etcetera, etcetera introduced the brand
to athletes and their supporters in just about
every sporting code.
But, while he enjoys straight-talking, Fuller
is also uncompromising about straight-dealing.
Shortly after they signed a contract with the
#1 Rugby League team in Australia, it became
known that they had been involved in cap
cheating. Skins immediately ended the relationship.
“It was such a good relationship to be in —
they were the top team with a massive following
— and I wondered if this was the right
thing to do,” says Fuller. “But then I thought,
no, these are our values, this is what we stand
for, no matter how good the opportunity, we
can’t continue the relationship.”
The same applied when players who said
they loved the product so much that they
would endorse it for nothing, but whose values
didn’t fit, approached them. “We told
them where to go.”
New structures
Their global expansion in 2007 created the
need for private equity investment, and this
briefly changed the brand, says Fuller. The
board demanded a much safer approach, especially
in advertising, which convinced him
to raise money to buy back the brand in 2012.
“We wanted to focus on building consumer
demand, not change the culture of what and
how we do it. We want investors who can buy
into it.”
Had he not bought back the brand, he
wouldn’t have been able to embark on his
new role, travelling the world and blogging
to advocate responsibility in sport governance
through campaigns like the Skins-sponsored
Pure Sport movement. He also wouldn’t have
had the freedom to play a role in toppling the
former world cycling regime (See p42).
Never happy with the nitty-gritty of the dayto-day
running of the business, Fuller began
looking for someone with strong operational
abilities to take over his role as CEO in 2010
— and eventually found the right person in Nic
Versloot in April 2012.
While still involved with some operational
functions and using his experience and high
profile to contribute towards brand building,
he says he’s now doing what he loves: bringing
accountability to sport.
2014 March :: Sports Trader