Background
Since 1962, Havaianas has been a global ambassador of Brazilian culture around the world, celebrated for its iconic rubber sole and vibrant, summer-infused designs. With annual sales exceeding 250 million pairs across more than 100 countries, Havaianas has solidified its status as the essence of modern flip flops, beloved by beachgoers and trendsetters worldwide. From the bustling streets of Brazil to the prestigious galleries of New York’s renowned contemporary art museums, Havaianas stands as a global icon.
Havaianas is characterised by a sophisticated supply model, comprising large stock service lines, multiple indent seasons, diverse pricing mechanisms and an incredibly broad product range with long production lead-times and disjointed seasonality due to the Brazilian manufacturing base. When the Brazilians are starting to wind down, the Aussies are just getting started! With that comes a compressed order-to-supply window and the importance of successfully capturing orders quickly and efficiently during the sales process is paramount.
According to Havaianas General Manager, Tom Nolan, “When I joined Havaianas over eight years ago I was surprised that such a significant brand was relying on spreadsheets to capture such a high volume of orders and then importing those orders back into their SAP ERP with limited analysis. The obvious answer was to implement a refined and automated platform like Brandscope to get more control over the order process and maximise the all sales opportunities across products and supporting point of sale. It didn’t take much to convince the CFO to allocate budget to the tool as it represented an immediate return on investment for both sales and marketing.”
Solution
Havaianas integrated Brandscope into their SAP ERP and uploaded both indent and refill collections onto the platform. This integration streamlined the process by automating the upload of individual retail orders into the SAP environment against the relevant retail partner account. It also automated the update of available inventory at size level for current and future months within Brandscope, ensuring that all sales and retail users had a 24/7 view of all available inventory.
Following the integration, Brandscope launched an EDM campaign targeted at retail partners, informing them about the partnership and guiding them on how to access and use the system for placing both indent and refill orders. Marketing assets were also uploaded onto the platform to facilitate the simultaneous capture of product orders and relevant POS requests during the indent process.
To enhance marketing efforts, a dedicated Havaianas brand landing page was created within Brandscope, featuring links to videos, lookbooks, lifestyle imagery and other supporting assets to promote key product lines and marketing themes effectively.
As part of the configuration process, educational and marketing assets were also uploaded at product level to enrich storytelling capabilities and ensure that retail buyers and their associates had all the relevant information at their fingertips to formulate accurate buying and marketing decisions.
Retailers were grouped into relevant geographic territories and connected with respective sales representatives and independent agents to foster collaboration in indent and refill ordering. The final step involved comprehensive training for all users, ensuring continuous engagement and maximising its beneficial impact.
“The onboarding process was slick”, recounts Tom, “and was finalised over a ten week period ensuring minimal disruption within the business. A number of our retail and sales partners were also familiar with the tool so the scene was set for a quick adoption which was very important to upper management.”
Outcome
The introduction of Brandscope reduced their sell period by four to six weeks and allowed Havaianas a crucial extra month in lead time to facilitate early and comprehensive fulfillment. The earlier data collection also contributed to the business intelligence and manufacturing decision making processes in identifying key sellers within the collections which could be supported with additional stock purchases.
“Reducing the guesswork has made the business more efficient and most importantly has reduced inventory issues which has resulted in less discounting and a more curated offer”, said Tom. “When it comes to in-season business, they say you can’t predict the weather, but you can plan for it and Brandscope allows our partners to immediately respond in our peak period.”
Havaianas experienced a considerable sales spike when the system went live, eventually resulting in a 30%+ increase in refill business within the first 24 months of implementation. This surge typically occurred between Sunday and Tuesday which anecdotally was the result of hot and sunny weekends.
“The platform delivered a level of immediacy and market connection that we’d not experienced previously”, summarised Tom. “It was a two-way data feed between the business and our partners whereby retailers could order 24/7 and respond quickly to demand, and Havaianas could get a quick read on the market and supply accordingly.”
“Our retail partners really embraced the independence that the Brandscope platform awarded them with respect to both accurate and timely information which allowed them to really support the brand (… and also their customers) at an unheralded level.”
Retailer’s improved access to a ‘one stop shop’ for digital and physical brand assets improved ordering efficiency and allowed customers to pick and choose a bespoke range of marketing and educational assets that aligned with the seasonal buy to support both in-store and direct to consumer digital marketing.
“With over 880 national doorways, communication was historically a pain point, especially for the dissemination of marketing paraphernalia,” recalls Tom, “but the introduction of Brandscope has ensured Havaianas can distribute assets quicker to market and manage obsolescence based on availability and global direction. As a marketing tool, the platform has proven to be incredibly powerful and effective.”
By implementing the Brandscope sales and marketing platform, Havaianas have reinvented the approach to market responsiveness and asset management, positioning the business as a more agile and customer-focused brand. By integrating digital and physical asset distribution into a seamless platform, Brandscope has streamlined operations, enhanced partner engagement, and optimised their product offering to meet global demands effectively.
Testimonial
“Implementing Brandscope into the Havaianas business process was a game-changer for our sales teams and retail partners. It streamlined our operations, reduced guesswork and significantly improved efficiency across our sales and marketing initiatives.”
