Fashion designer and businessman Ron Morrison, Chief Executive Officer of the fashion design company Mori J’Von, is working to consolidate the local and regional market for apparel manufactured by the internationally renowned North Carolina-based company Hanes.
Morrison, who along with his fiancé and the company’s Managing Director, Miss Guyana-World winner Olive Gopaul manage Mori J’Von has been, for the past five years, the holder of an agreement with the multi-million dollar company to market its high-end leisure wear and underclothing in the Caribbean.
Since securing the Hanes contract Mori J’Von has recruited retail outlets across the country to market the popular brand that has long enjoyed a sound reputation in Guyana. Morrison says that Mori J’Von has also established business links with retailers in Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados. Mori J’Von has reached agreement with a Jamaican business enterprise which will see the launch of a ‘flagship’ Hanes outlet in Kingston shortly.
While Morrison and Gopaul continue to monitor the growth of the Hanes market in the region their immediate focus is on the expansion of the local market. Morrison told Stabroek Business that Mori J’Von is “very pleased” with the inroads which the Hanes brand has made with local consumers. It is, he says, “a reflection of changing times and changing fashion. There is definitely a consumer preoccupation with brand names.”
While Hanes has traditionally been renowned for high-quality but ‘regulation’ t-shirts, vests and underwear, Morrison says that the company has broadened its apparel line and “jazzed up” its designs to take account of changing tastes. “We have had no problem selling the brand – so to speak.”
The establishment of Mori J;Von’s Hanes retail outlet on Robb street was a response to what Morrison describes as market forces. “As the franchise holder we were satisfied with distributing Hanes products to the major stores. Mori J’Von took the position however that since its marketing focus was on popularizing Hanes apparel in Guyana by making retail prices as reasonable as possible we would create our own retail outlet in order to make prices more reasonable.”
Morrison says that the advent of a Hanes distributorship in Guyana has also seen the development of new relationships between Mori J’Von and several major business enterprises in Guyana. “Our high-quality polo shirts are in high demand among companies who are inclined to provide their staff with logo-branded apparel.”
Mori J’Von Managing Director Olive Gopaul told Stabroek Business that the distributorship contract with Hanes has enabled the company to meet what she says has been a long unmet need for bulk quantities of high quality shirts. “Traders and other importers have been unable to respond to the demand for large orders by companies like GT&T and DIGICEL. Mori J’Von has been able to fill that gap in the market.”
Gopaul’s own experience in the world of fashion has added value to Mori J’Von’s efforts to market the Hanes product in Guyana. She says that the focus by the company on seeking to satisfy the broadest possible range of tastes has seen the advent of new, more creative designs and colours in Hanes apparel.
“These days. A t-shirt is no longer simply a t-shirt. We have different designs in t-shirts and each year Hanes declares a new portfolio of colours, For 2008 we have around sixty six colours.” Gopaul says that the contemporary Hanes design culture has enabled the company to produce apparel “that is appropriate across the fashion spectrum, from casual to formal-casual. What pleases us is the fact that we have been able to meet the tastes of both the ‘racy’ teenage culture as well as the older dresser who still wants to be fashion-conscious.”
Gopaul says that the advent of a Hanes distributor in Guyana coincides with changing life styles. “What we have been able to do is to take Hanes clothing to fashion-type events. We have sponsored various beauty queens and even though, by pageant standards, Hanes is a relatively conservative brand we have been able to step into the domain of pageantry.”
Last year Hanes recorded global sales in excess of more than US$700m worldwide and Morrison estimates that eight out of ten households in Guyana are “aware” of the Hanes brand. Mori J’Von is preparing to launch a major marketing programme to coincide with CARIFESTA 2008. Morison says that Mori J’Von is anticipating an increase in regional patronage since, in effect, Guyana is the regional headquarters for the Hanes brand.
He says that the company’s marketing strategy will seek to supplant some of the “big names” that have come to be associated with Hanes advertising with local models. “It really is our way of giving local talent a chance to be seen and to become identified,” Morrison says.
