While raising its total advertising and sports marketing budget to 16 percent of sales this year, Sergio Tacchini is launching a new advertising campaign in Europe around the “Sport Ego” tagline, in an effort to project a younger, more cosmopolitan and more dynamic image of the brand. To develop its new advertising campaign, which will kick off in April, the company hired a renowned New York photographer, Howard Schatz. An expert in body art who has worked in the past for the likes of Adidas and Nike, he has created strong images of paint on human bodies to convey the message of a well-tailored product for strong, demanding individuals sure of themselves, who are not afraid of wearing a sharp, distinct style.
Sergio Tacchini has also hired a new marketing manager, Antonella Rossi, who worked previously for Diesel, filling a temporary void in the management. The Italian company plans to invest up to €30 million in the promotion of its brand over the next three years. This year alone, the company will spend €6 million on advertising and €3.5 million in sports marketing. The brand currently sponsors athletes, teams and events such as Tommy Robredo, Olivier Rochus, Filippo Volandri, Xavier Malisse, Flavia Pennetta, Vera Dushevina, the +39 Challenge, the Italian Sailing Tour and Team Océan, its largest French recipient.
The Sport Ego concept will play a central role in revamping the company’s 200 single-brand stores, 140 of which are in Italy. Sergio Tacchini hopes to open 15 more stores in 2006. About half of them will be located in Italy, and the other half elsewhere in Europe, but there are no specific plans to open any in France, where the company decided last year to close all its stores because they were generating losses, while antagonizing independent retailers. The first single-brand Sergio Tacchini store in Poland is scheduled to open at the end of 2006. Five such stores already exist in the Czech Republic.
The Sergio Tacchini brand, which has been on the market for 40 years, posted sales of €160 million in 2005, including €40 million worth of licensed products. Including royalties, revenues increased to €120 million from €112 million in 2004. The new licenses and the new advertising campaign are expected to push sales up by 18 percent over the next two years, taking them back up to the level at which they were prior to the store closings in France, where the company has placed a new manager, Lydie Galland, at the head of its local sales subsidiary.
Apparel currently represents 80 percent of the brand’s sales, but the company wants to increase the percentage derived from footwear through its recently signed partnership with Groupe Royer of France. It will also focus on developing its women’s collection, which currently represents only 20 percent of sales. About 60 percent of branded sales are in Italy, followed by France with 20 percent. Fashion and leisure wear represent about one-half of apparel sales under the Sergio Tacchini brand in Italy, but only 20 percent of sales in France, where active sports products take the lion’s share.
Having re-entered the North American market through a joint venture with Marin Group, Sergio Tacchini is now looking for ways to expand in Asia, possibly by replacing its own Japanese subsidiary with a licensee that would cover other Far East countries as well. Talks with potential partners have been initiated, but no deals have been closed yet.
