Company profile
The Beaurepaire clan has always been involved in keeping the wheels of industry turning.
From the tyre repair service set up by the family patriarch Frank in the early part of last century to the founding of an eyewear distribution firm by ancestors William and his father Richard more than 80 years later, the family has always managed to produce ambitious offspring with a flair for running successful enterprises.
And Will, as he prefers to be known, is no exception.
Having founded Beauvision as a wholly-owned company within the family group back in 2004, he has helped drive the business to the point where it is now considered the fourth biggest eyewear distribution company in Australia.
Not content to stop there, the newest Beaurepaire on the business block aims to stamp out what he sees as the "outdated business practices" of many suppliers in the industry and take it to number two within the next three years.
It is, he admits, an ambitious project but one he is more than ready to eyeball.
The connection between the Beaurepaires and eyewear first come about when the family acquired an established distribution company called Imageoptics from industry stalwart Vic Westacott some years back. The acquisition brought with it the fashionable Police, Sting and Fila brands and proved a springboard to dealings with established Italian eyewear supplier De Rigo Vision, believed to be the third largest eyewear manufacturer on the globe. Having become personal friends with the De Rigo family and their senior executives, the Beaurepaires founded Beauvision in 2004, incorporating these brands with those from other high profile labels to boost the business.
Today the company has more than 15 Italian brands in its stable and has more than 600 stockists throughout Australia and New Zealand. Boasting an impressive 150 years-plus worth of experience, it has sales teams based in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Christchurch across the Tasman.
Keen to capitalise on its energetic management, the company has segmented its target markets based upon three product groups: aspirational (those that make up either the younger, brand-conscious Generation Y consumers or more price-conscious members of the wider community seeking quality at a reasonable price tag), fashion (those that are highly-visible, large personality products whose success is based on the power of the brand name, followed by the product and where the price tag is not such a problem) and connoisseur (those that revolve around the more understated ideals of quality and heritage).
By covering the sub-premium, premium and luxury price points, it can charge anywhere between $140 and $600 for its product.
On the matter of sales strategies, Beaurepaire says one of the biggest challenges for the company is the sheer number of eyewear distributors competing in the marketplace.
On last count there were more than 200 operating in Australia, therefore success in initial account penetration and stockist support came from the brand boasting a combination of personal relationships, strong sales support and effective visual merchandising, he says.
"Sales representatives are critical through both the development of a personal relationship but also to invigorate instore staff to sell the brands through training and networking with the most junior staff members Instore staff are usually different to the person who actually ordered the stock, therefore getting their buy-in is critical to success."
For this reason the brand sees offering its staff incentives as a key sales strategy.
"We strongly believe in reward and recognition for performance. We have found this to be particularly useful as most of our competitors incentivise the store management, who usually don't directly influence the purchasing behaviour of end consumers."
While it is clear the brand has been effectively able to penetrate the highly competitive eyewear market, Beaurepaire says it wasn't always such an easy nut to crack with credibility being one of the biggest challenges faced by the brand.
The eyewear industry is very parochial and customer relationships are king, he says.
"However the catch is that until your credibility and relationship is high with a customer, they will not order from you. Therefore, persistency is essential - in some ways, customers test your credibility by rejecting you to see if you are resilient and will work hard to help their business."
Having had his perseverance pay off, Beaurepaire is now keen to acquire further eyewear brands to leverage the company's structure and experience.
He also helps to more closely align the Beauvision offering with his parents' high quality wine business where he believes the potential to cross-promote is "very high".
And his advice to others keen to "When it comes to tailoring your product offerings . . . keep in mind that every special consideration adds directly or indirectly to your costs. You will need to have more highly trained staff and better systems to manage the different trading terms. When we offer special consideration over our standard trading terms, we look at the stores relevance both monetarily and positioning before adding to our sales bill. However the market is becoming increasingly competitive due to the proliferation of shopping malls with onerous tenancy agreements so expect the worst when it comes to negotiating and budget for it."