New Seafolly chief slams state’s lockdown

Seafolly is pinning its hopes on a stronger domestic market, where consumers travel locally and spend on new swimwear.

Seafolly has 29 stores in Australia. Four of its stores in Melbourne are closed. It also has four stores in Singapore. Picture: Supplied

The new chief executive of swimwear business Seafolly, Brendan Santamaria, has added his name to the chorus of retail leaders criticising the Victorian government’s slow exit from stage four restrictions, saying it would have a “dreadful” impact on the sector just as it faces the crucial spring and summer seasons.

It comes as Seafolly pins its hopes on a stronger domestic market, where consumers who are unable to travel overseas choose to travel locally and spend money on items such as new swimwear, with the brand’s inbound international tourist market dormant for the moment.

Newly appointed to Seafolly after it was restructured and revived from voluntary administration three months ago by its private equity owned L Catterton, Mr Santamaria said the Victorian government’s failure to fix a date for when retail could reopen made it extremely difficult to plan stock, rosters and staff.

He added that he couldn’t see Melbourne’s retail sector opening “this side of November” and that this would have a terrible impact on the fashion industry, not just in Victoria but for the rest of the country.

“I think it has a dreadful impact on our industry because it is where new seasons are normally launched,’’ Mr Santamaria told The Australian on Tuesday.

“We are coming into spring so you can imagine what spring and summer means to this time of the year, to our potential of hitting our numbers for the year.”

On Sunday Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews released his pathway to extract the state from its suffocating stage four COVID-19 restrictions, but his plan was immediately savaged by the business and retail community over its long delays in seeing any stores able to reopen because of extremely high benchmarks set for infection rates.

“It has a terrible impact and we really can’t see anything opening this side of November based on what was released on Sunday,’’ Mr Santamaria said.

“And I think the total fashion industry is in the same boat; spring is such a big time of the year for the new season and it will have a massive impact on the businesses of the sector.

“I think the inability to have a drop date (for store openings) on stock ordering, rostering, etc — it just makes it extremely difficult. And you just have to look at the size of what Victoria is to the nation.’’

Seafolly has 29 stores in Australia. Four of its stores in Melbourne are closed. It also has four stores in Singapore.

It lurched into voluntary administration in June in an embarrassing blow to the financial and fashion prowess of French luxury goods retailer Luis Vuitton, which bought a 70 per cent stake in the Australian brand for $70m in 2014 through its investment arm L Catterton.

Now L Catterton has retrieved it from administration, bought another swimwear brand — Jets — and appointed Mr Santamaria as its new CEO.

“I think our focus from a communication perspective is all around domestic, so a focus on beach, going back to the beach when we come out of this nightmare. But Australians won’t be travelling, Europeans won’t be travelling, Americans won’t be travelling, so we have got all our campaigns focused on getting our consumer to come in a store or buy online, through our wholesale partners, in each market, and holidaying within their own country.

“I think what we have done through the administration is realign the business, realigned our retail footprint, renegotiated our terms with all of our key supply partners, being landlords or product supply.

“No one can tell us when this pandemic is going to finish but we have a team now that’s on board that can be ready and a lot of work behind it when we come out of this. People haven’t travelled in winter and so there is going to be some discretionary spend around we hope, and people will be hitting the beaches.”