Massimo Renon COURTESY PHOTO
Launched almost 60 years ago, eyewear company Marcolin Group is known for its luxury eyewear ranges. The company, which has a portfolio of eyewear brands which include Tom Ford, Moncler, Swarovski and Bally, earned 482.2 million euros or 534.9 million dollars last year. According to Marcolin Group chief executive officer Massimo Renon, heritage, DNA, and a strong focus on quality and innovation are three key pillars for the company.
"I think the secret is in the quality of what we produce,” said Renon. "We’re proud of our heritage. We've tried to deploy all this heavy digital DNA into the quality of the product. So we believe that our customers and the consumers are giving the premium to our product when they buy because they are investing a lot in the quality."
Renon noted that the focus next year is to consolidate all the new brands that the company has just launched to a better core to market and have a more commercial, presence, especially in the emerging markets. "We announced the opening of the Singapore branch a few weeks ago after and following the opening of the Hong Kong branch almost a year ago,” said Renon. “In 2020, we will start up the new subsidiary in Australia as well."
He eluded that currently there are a few challenges in the market. “The market is moving rapidly,” said Renon. “There are some players that are getting bigger and bigger are dominating our market. This is the challenge. Being able to get to the consumer and to our customer in a way that we, that we represent to them."
Among their roll-out plans includes a focus on innovation and digital reinvention. "We have to make sure that we have a very attentive eye to what's happening in terms of technology," said Renon. "So now we are very much focused on understanding what can be added value that we put in our eyewear technology. We're growing very fast. We are trying to have some agreements with very big players in this. I think in the next few months we will be able to develop something much more."
The eyewear company is also focused on making itself more modern and appealing more towards the younger demographic. "Millennials are a big bunch of our potential customers for the future,” said Renon. "So the fact that we're adding young talents, and young people, they will be able to make the company fresher to the company. This is a real change of mindset that the company has now."
Renon said that they want to interact with Millennials to be able to meet and understand their needs. "They're not a loyal customer at all as we know,” said Renon. "So they are very quick and fast. They buy and they change their mind very fast. So we have to understand that through the younger people in the team and through social networks, the best way to reach them.”
Sustainability is also a focus for the company. "We want to innovate our business model differently, said Renon. “And have more action on the sustainability process. The company is making a very important decision, which is to put all our effort and focus into certifying our processes, materials coming in, getting our eyewear frames in order to make sure it is sustainable."
Renon indicated that the company already has in place a very process in place and that most of the vendors they work within their portfolio are certified. He said the next step is to ensure that the quality of the material is sustainable. "When we talk about material and certified suppliers, we have brands like Timberland that are putting a lot of attention to it,” said Renon. “And that we have a very strict policy as by them. But we've are of course already compliant on this by finding suppliers with the right criteria and the right elements that are distinguishing their sustainability approach."
A campaign image for Timberland eyewear COURTESY PHOTO
The core customer for the company includes independent opticians. They also have key accounts or organized channels like chains or buying groups as well as travel retail accounts and department stores. Among the bestsellers in the Marcolin portfolio, Tom Ford is a key brand for the company. “We have two big brands like Tom Ford and Guess,” said Renon. "Tom Ford has always some of the best selling models. It’s at the top of the ranking, not only over or in frames, but in the industrial frames. And the design, quality and shape of those models are really interesting. So I would say that for sure the top models out of 10 in the ranking are coming from Tom Ford."
A campaign image for Tom Ford eyewear COURTESY PHOTO