UK-born activewear brand Sweaty Betty is pushing ahead with an Australian launch, locking in local distribution, big-box wholesale partners and a store rollout strategy that leans heavily on community engagement.
The brand’s parent company Wolverine Worldwide signed a distribution agreement with The Nevada Company in New Zealand, which is also running Sweaty Betty distribution in Australia through a separate but related entity. The brand already has two stores in New Zealand.
David Steans, who runs The Nevada Company with his wife Elle, told Ragtrader he was looking at sites in Melbourne late last year for a potential retail debut for Sweaty Betty in Australia.
“New Zealand is slightly more advanced, but it's that home turf advantage for the New Zealand entity,” Steans said. “We've got a slightly different shareholding for Australia, but that business is off the ground.
“We've got customer service there, and we're looking at moving all our stock, which is actually based in Christchurch, to Australia. But we deliver faster to market from Christchurch than we would if we had a 3PL operator in Australia, which is just insane.
“So we can get overnight into all the main centres in Australia whereas if we go with a local delivery service, many are saying two to three days. It's a big conundrum that we've got a tackle in the business at the moment.”
Sweaty Betty sells a range of activewear and a selection of accessories, with its Australian prices sitting in mid double digits to low triple digits. A pair of full-length leggings generally cost between $159 to $219.
The brand currently sells through online in Australia, with David Steans confirming the brand will ramp up its wholesale arm amid conversations with big-box retailers, set to launch later this year. This will be in line with a store rollout, with Steans focusing on high street locations as well as large centres across the country.
“My preference is high street, because we can run our own cutter. We can do our own events after hours; run clubs, yoga, all that sort of stuff. Our main motivation with our stores is, and it seems a bit cliche at the moment, but it is a community hub. Everyone seems to be driving that way, but this is the way of new retail at the moment. You can't just open the door and expect people to flood in.”
In its New Zealand stores, Sweaty Betty has brought in speakers on motivation, targeting mental health, yoga, activation, sound baths. All those things that women are looking for, for their own little escape or support, according to Steans. “That's exactly how we need to drive the brand, and that's true to the brand values, which is where we're focusing.”
Steans said the rollout timing here for Australia is to match with the classic European vs Australian problem with seasons. Sweaty Betty is a counter-seasonal brand, so he and his team are trying to summer-ise and winter-ise the collections for local distribution.
“There are four collections a year, so we'll take one of their shoulder seasons and flip that and make that a main launch for spring,” Steans said. “That's one of the challenges of operating a European brand. But being part of the brand, we get to create capsules and things ourselves. So if we really like a print, then we can go and make a head to toe look on that. The brand is really dynamic.”
This means getting more shorts into Australia for the summer that has just passed and stocking up for the coming of winter.
“But the bulk of the collection can be trans seasonal,” Steans said. “It's just the colouration that we've got to be really mindful of for Australia; it's more tonal, muted tones, but then sometimes styles like our punchy pink have sold really well because of that colour impact and getting it at the right time.”
When asked about the current market, with both Australia and New Zealand facing consumer sentiment pressures, stubborn inflation and soft spending growth, Steans said there is never a perfect time to sign a major distribution deal. But he added that we can only go up from here.
“There was a little bit of an uproar about the fact that we opened [stores] in New Zealand instead of Australia first, which is understandable. We’ve got a solid customer base in Australia.
"But for us, giving women more access to the brand in 2026 is going to be a real key focus."