Les cahiers de Intima - Milavitsa - (Page 12)

Focus on Milavitsa Business Development and Brand Identity What are the priorities of Milavitsa today? What are the new targets of this highly dynamic company? Which are the new challenges their young jet professional management team is ready to face? Sergei Kusonski, Vice Chairman of Milavitsa, introduces here the strategic direction of the company for the years to come. Sergei, among your different tasks in the company you are in charge of international development. What are your main targets today? Beside our steady investments and development in our home markets including Russia and Ukraine, where we’ve been already established for a long time, we are concentrating our efforts in expanding our presence in western countries which represent only 7% of our global business today. To meet this target we are following two complementary paths, both based on our major competitive advantages. The first concerns our branded offer to local retailers, the second regards our renewed private label offer. In order to achieve these objectives, it was important for us to better introduce Milavitsa to the whole industry and increase our visibility within our markets, this is why we decided to partner with Intima for the production of the present Cahier. As for your branded offer, how are you planning Milavitsa’s expansion abroad? Some years ago we have segmented our offer and today we own three major brands: Milavitsa, Alisee and Aveline; each brand has a different price point and targets a different consumer group, making it easy for our present and future clients to pick up the most suitable line for their countries and stores. Furthermore, Milavitsa’s retailing experience – we count over 350 stores, operated directly or through retail partners – provides interesting franchising opportunities to potential partners in any new country. Most of your stores are located in former Soviet Union countries, are you also considering to establish in Western Europe too? In fact, we have just inaugurated our first Milavitsa store in Dortmund, Germany; it is a franchising store with a local partner. Other locations will be announced soon… You said your second direction is private label production…how can you compete with Asian countries? Not on cheap products, for sure. There will always be someone, somewhere in the world, who will offer a cheaper price. This is not a long term strategy for a company like ours and we are not going that way. Nevertheless, we still believe there is room for a reliable, closer supplier, capable of assuring the shortest time to market. We don’t look for one time deals, but for a long term cooperation for mutual growth and development. Will you then offer ODM service to your customers? Our internal well structured 17 people design and development team can allow us to offer our private label clients to choose from a variety of shapes and styles but also sizes, which is a significant advantage. Moreover, 75% of our extensive range of 550 styles is new, which means the company develops and launches over 400 new models per year. We are also organized to welcome and fulfill our clients’ whishes if needed. What is your definition of partnership? For me partnership is all about mutually beneficial long term cooperation where trust, as well as understanding and respecting each other's needs, play important roles. With some of our suppliers and trading partners we established a cooperation 10, 15 and, sometimes, over 20 years ago. Together we have passed through many difficult periods; together we also reached a lot of heights. This couldn’t be achieved without a shared business philosophy, trust and open communication. This is something which has been established in the company a long time ago, something which is inherited from the character of the Belarussian people – hard work, tolerance, flexibility and drive towards mutual success. We continue promoting this set of values and principles internally today in order to serve our clients at the highest level. Milavitsa’s key differentiation factors Reliability Product quality Big cup size expertise Fitting Geographical & cultural proximity 10

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Les cahiers de Intima - Milavitsa