Finalist General Pants Company

BEST CHAIN

With more than 30 outlets across Australia, youth and streetwear retailer General Pants Company appears to have achieved the retail equivalent of having one's cake and eating it; a thriving chain with an emphatically "indie" image.

As well as a wide range of popular youth labels, the store stocks exclusive local and international brands, many of them - like California-based streetwear brand Modern Amusement - US brands with a small foothold in the Australian market.

The company gives such brands a high level of support and has a reputation for fun, edgy advertising campaigns. More significantly, General Pants utilises dedicated events or parties to make a direct connection with its target market.

These are too numerous to list, although a notable landmark in recent years was sponsorship of the MTV awards, a move that considerably broadened its access to a youth audience.

General Pants' community and charity activities are also closely aligned with its target market. It regularly supports youth charities, and its recent Green Hearts eco-friendly bags campaign consulted directly with customers, encouraging them to cast votes online on their requirements for sustainable shopping bags.

Clearly this is more than just a fashion forward company with the financial clout to create impressive ads and launch events. It has a fully integrated branding strategy that pervades every aspect of its business, from its funky website to its high level of customer service.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the area of General Pants "people", claims marketing manager Colin Blake.

"Quite simply the best thing about General Pants is that the culture is created through the people," he says.

For this reason, many of the company's buyers are under 25 years old.

"The buyers are our market. It makes perfect sense that the people making the decisions are the people closest to the market."

As the title of General Pants' catalogue-cum-cult-magazine Our People suggests, the company's communications strategy underpins an ethos based around the concept of community.

"Our People" is a loss leader but it's very much about brand building," Blake explains.

General Pants also publishes an internal magazine or "bragazine" - a youth oriented, fun and casual staff communication tool that is informative but also has a bit of attitude."

In store visual merchandising is edgy and creative, with an emphasis on "strong new spaces" and the national visual merchandising manager regularly produces a merchandising standards manual, although each store retains some individuality.

General Pants operates a formal in-house training program and all staff undergo an induction on the company's policies and procedures.

The marketing and human resources departments schedule staff merchandise incentives in line with specific promotions and the company also awards financial bonuses according to monthly individual and store targets, accelerating these to weekly targets during the lead up to Christmas.

In line with its target market, General Pants' customer loyalty program, is decidedly non-conventional, and is often centred around exclusive product. A recent example of this comprised a pair of limited edition Raygun Dunk shoes.

"Rather than put the shoes in the stores we built an experience around them offering them exclusively to our database [customers]. Our 'sneaker freaker' customer goes nuts for this kind of thing," says Blake.
Being an edgy youth brand does not mean skimping on customer service. While the approach is informal and relaxed, it remains nothing less than professional.

"We're very passionate about good customer service. Simply put, we have the best people who love what they do."

Later, Blake puts it even more succinctly. "The staff are the brand."

For a national chain General Pants has a refreshingly genuine philosophy, to create an emotional bond that links brand, staff and customers into a single borderless community.

"This is about a long term strategy to build relationships with our customers. It's not just about how we performed sales wise this week and reacting to it. That's the bottom line."