Staying at the Top in the Apparel Business—Lessons from Pepe Jeans

Meta Title: Sharing Some Words with the Product Head of Pepe Jeans

Meta Description: This interview blog post is an interesting read for all the people in the fashion industry out there. Keep reading!

Summary: Amit Kumar, on their new venture—innerwear by Pepe Jeans London. Exploring the D2C space, his roles and responsibilities in the company, challenges in the apparel supply chain and overcoming them, the role of technology in the business, the importance of sustainability and compliance, managing and facing competition, and meeting rapidly changing customer preferences. Read the interview for some valuable insights into the fashion industry. 

Pepe Jeans Inner fashion—Straight from the Horse’s Mouth

Amit Kumar is the product head of Pepe Jeans (inner fashion). He looks after some of the vital segments of the brand, from trend forecasting, design and concept development, visual communication, and market research to collaboration and coordination. With all these responsibilities on his plate, he shares some words of wisdom on how to stay relevant in this cut-throat competitive market.

In this interview, Amit talks about their joint venture involving Pepe Jeans Barcelona and Dollar. It was later steered by Goat Labs in 2022 with the primary intention of upscaling the brand in the D2C space. 

"We were already popular in the traditional marketplace and modern retail. Goat Labs has helped us reach out to a bigger audience. Now Pepe Jeans innerwear is available on leading online platforms, including Amazon, Myntra, and similar channels." - Amit Kumar.

What does a typical day look like as a Product Head at Pepe Jeans?

Well, my days are not fully pre-planned. Certain things, I know, I need to do the next day. However, some events break out of the blue. I need to attend to them urgently. Also, I play a dual role in the company. Apart from being the Product Head, I also double as the Design Manager (because I come from a design background). My core duties involve the following:

• Looking at the sales

• Recognizing areas that can be explored for improvement

• Keeping an eye on both the Product and Design departments

What challenges do you face in the Supply Chain and sourcing, and how do you overcome them? 

Many challenges come our way, season to season. 

For example - some of the products in our innerwear and loungewear line have been integral to our portfolio for a long time. 

Here the challenge is to be consistent with the prices and product quality to ensure our customers are happy.

Also, there are some instances when the prices of the raw materials go up. In such scenarios, we cannot increase our product prices just like that. So, what we do is look for new avenues. It helps us stay put with competition and maintain a high standard.

For us, improvement is the key to staying ahead of the competition. We keep our market analysis game 'high' to find what's new and where Pepe Jeans fits in the spectrum.

We restock our products every two to three months. The most challenging thing here is to come up with more products in the same range with better quality and better pricing.

How does technology help with the apparel Supply Chain? 

The e-commerce space is rapidly transforming, with new opportunities right at your door, but sometimes for a short span. 

We look forward to the tech space. We use reliable trend-forecasting service platforms and our internal data for market analysis and feedback. 

The state-of-the-art technologies also help us keep track of our Supply Chain and sales activities by letting us do our job seamlessly, including:

• Identifying if or not a product is delayed

• Identifying slow-moving products

• Recognizing the products that need to be replenished

How does technology help in predicting demand?

Our channel partners and sales teams continuously provide data that helps us understand our market and sales activities. We also use software that gives us a detailed insight into our stock by generating a weekly report. The report allows us to track the inventory and sales status, which in turn helps us find solutions to deal with them.

How important are sustainability and compliance to the apparel supply chain?

Sustainability and compliance are so-very-critical to supply chain and vendor management. Therefore, we always work with vendors and factories that adhere to sustainability and compliance guidelines. 

How do you handle the competition?

Although Pepe Jeans is a new entrant in the innerwear space, it is a renowned brand with more than 30 years of presence in the market. For us, understanding customer demand and living up to it is a priority. 

As far as competition is concerned, the best and biggest innerwear brands in the world offer a wide span of products - right from basic mass prices to the premium range. 

We aim to address both markets. We intend to sell competitively-priced products to people from tier 2 and tier 3 cities (who do not want to spend too much on inners) and to our fashion customers (who are not hesitant to buy high-end products). 

Our collection lives up to the quality, comfort, performance, and budget preferences of our customers. Starting from super premium cotton to siro micro modals and 91-9 spandex—we have it all.

How does Pepe Jeans cope with rapidly-changing fashion choices?

To stay relevant in the market, we keep ourselves updated about the latest market trends and listen to customer feedback to meet their expectations in the best possible way. The online space has helped us do that properly. 

Do you have any predictions for the upcoming trend, and where do you see yourself in the innerwear category?

Currently, the innerwear market is divided into - mass, mid, mid-premium, premium, and super-premium-priced products. Our challenge is to cater to a wide audience while providing best-in-class innerwear at the best prices. 

We understand what our customers want. It helps bring the right products to them. This way, we connect with our customers. At Pepe Jeans, we believe that unless you resonate with your customers and meet their true requirements, you won't be able to sell them fashion. Our constant urge to stay connected with our customer base gets us going.

Wrapping things up!

It was nice to have Amit share his thoughts and insights on the prevailing challenges in the D2C market and how he, as a Product Head, deals with them impeccably while staying connected to the customers.

Key takeaways

• Improvement is the key to staying ahead of the competition.

• Sustainability and compliance are important.

• Understanding customer needs provides a better connection with the audience.