Canterbury faces life without All Blacks

By DITA DE BONI

LWR Industries was in "chaos" when the firm's minority shareholders were taken out by investment consortium CHL in mid-1999, according to the story told this week.

Falling tariffs on imports had eroded market share, and the company was competing against the likes of Nike, adidas and Reebok at home and overseas. Falling earnings and decreasing margins seared LWR's balance sheet, and import tariffs were dangerously perched to tumble to zero.

A protracted investment raid by CHL, led by expatriate David Teece, took the company private.

LWR delisted, sold the bulk of its underwear, lingerie and hosiery arm to Australian-based Pacific Dunlop, and the most profitable division, Canterbury International, was left in the hands of CHL and Brierley Investments.

The pair of raiders have since been "cleaning up" before a concerted launch into the international marketplace. This week they announced they were on track to achieve their objectives by July 1, although trying to fulfil huge orders for popular teamwear lines will hold up the process.

Nonetheless, unwieldy backlogs of less-popular product have been eliminated (one in an Australian warehouse was so high a fire warden threatened to to close it down).

A shortage of product that plagued some outlets will be rectified, retailer-customers will get their stock in time, ordering will be easier and electronic, and the new store prototype is as white, brash and zen as a Trelise Cooper boutique on testosterone.

Management has also reduced a staggering array of brand logos, streamlined staff numbers, and uncovered key personnel, who, according to Canterbury director Hap Klopp, "used to be treated like mushrooms - kept in the dark and fed manure."

It sounds as if it could work, and has before - small New Zealand niche player makes it big internationally.

But here's the catch: Canterbury will try to build a brand based solely on the image and "values" of rugby without the endorsement of New Zealand's national team, the All Blacks, with whom the brand had been associated for 75 years.

Mr Klopp exhorted the assembled troops in Auckland this week to not "dwell on the negatives" that have come from losing the ABs to adidas.

He rightly points out that the company is actually supporting the winners, having signed the Wallabies to a five-year licensing deal late last year, after the AB loss.

Not only that, but the Christchurch apparel makers outfit the Irish, Scottish, Fijian, Canadian and Japanese national teams and several high-profile Super 12 Australian teams.

The company's "honeycomb" headgear is still the most popular in rugby-playing nations, and it will augment its collection with items for the female and child player in the new season.

But despite the hoopla, the Sky City Cheerleaders, and the innovative new designs, one has to ask how Canterbury will leverage its profile overseas without the team that had, at one time, taken the brand to the world stage. Previously, on the strength of New Zealand's rugby prowess, Japanese tourists would flock to Canterbury stores to buy an "Aru Buracku" shirt.

Using rugby as its "heartbeat," the company aims for 15 per cent growth worldwide in the next 12 months, with a 70 per cent growth in Britain, and Europe sales and annual sales rivalling New Zealand's in North America.

Mr Klopp maintains the Canterbury brand is "more well known" than the AB brand name in several foreign markets.

The claim is debatable, but maybe it does not matter. Canterbury's new branding contains scenes of New Zealand, and plays on the heart and spirit of the peculiarly Australasian style of play.

It will be interesting to see if, in the international rugby retailing world, New Zealand without its team is as potent as before.