KEY POINTS:
Had Hallenstein Glasson's new chief executive Shayne Quanchi never had a stint on the shopfloor of a clothing boutique, life would have turned out quite differently.
"I actually wanted to be a hairdresser since I was 8 and left school at 15 to become a hairdresser. Once I qualified for my apprenticeship, I decided I'd have a change for 12 months."
Change meant moving from her hometown of Perth to Melbourne, where she took up a job as a sales assistant in a small casualwear store, Dainty Weapon.
"In those days we got paid commission. We had a base salary which was reasonable but we also got commission and it was quite good, so we fought for every sale."
She wound up staying for a year.
"I absolutely loved it except my feet hurt, so I thought: how can I stay in this trade and not be on my feet?"
The fashion was what she loved, and she took up a job as a trainee buyer with the department store Buckley & Nunn, later bought by David Jones, now Australia's second-largest department store chain.
From there on, hairdressing never got a second look in. She moved from Buckley & Nunn to rival department store Target in 1982 as a youth casualwear buyer, staying for four years before taking time out to have daughter Rebecca.
She returned to the industry in 1991 as a buyer and product developer for Just Jeans. There she developed all the women's tops range, and oversaw a more than doubling of sales over five years.
Starting up her own import and wholesale business, N E Wear, was the next step, providing clothing lines to women's brands such as Just Jeans, Sportsgirl, Miss Shop, Cotton On and Hot Options.
But Australia's largest department store chain, Myer, beckoned, and she joined in 2003 as business manager for its Miss Shop and Young Men's divisions, looking after a fashion portfolio worth A$300 million ($343 million).
Now she's in the top job of what is perhaps New Zealand's best-known clothing retailer.
She could not have come at a more challenging time. Consumer confidence is at a 10-year low as high interest rates, tumbling house prices and rising fuel and food costs bite into the discretionary dollar.
Like other retailers, Hallenstein Glasson is facing testing times ahead.
This week the company announced that half-year net profit after tax had fallen 6.6 per cent from $9.9 million to $9.2 million. Group sales for the six months ending February 1 dropped 2 per cent to $98.5 million.
And its 25 Glassons stores in Australia continue to limp along.
Quanchi readily admits that across the Ditch Glassons has a problem with image - specifically, it lacks one.
"The difference between Australia and New Zealand is that Glassons has been here a long time and all New Zealanders know what Glassons and Hallensteins are. Whereas in Australia they haven't got a clue."
The Glassons range is also looking a bit older than its target market, the Gen Ys. "We're missing a few looks, we're looking a little bit boring, and we really need to be on trend and up with the rest of the market. We're not catering as much to the Gen Y as we should be. If we think of her as 20 then we'll get it right."
She cites shirtdresses - a long buttoned shirt ending above the knee used to achieve layering - as one missing item in Glassons' range. Trans-seasonal ("buy now, wear now") products are also lacking.
"The kids of today want it now.
"Laybuys aren't the thing they used to be, where we put it on laybuy and pick it up when we had a cold snap. This is the now generation. So if they walk into our stores and don't find what's hot, they walk out again."
Just three weeks into the job, Quanchi is making Glassons her immediate priority.
"I don't have as many issues with Hallensteins as a I do Glassons - Hallensteins is going along quite nicely and management's fantastic.
"They've got all the resources basically that they need and their resources are right, whereas in Glassons we need to improve some of the areas and we're under-resourced."
Improving the product mix is crucial, she says. Key to that would be to increase the resourcing of the buying office, which has been hit with some senior management departures, including managing director Diane Humphries, who left in December.
"It's really all about the product.
"There's some good product in there, but we're just missing some key looks that we will need to get into. And I think our colours are little bit boring.
"It's not that our colours are wrong, we don't have enough of them."
The product mix will prove crucial to conquering the tough Australian market, which is where Quanchi and the Hallenstein Glasson board firmly believe new growth will originate.
"We'll still open new stores in New Zealand, but the growth is in Australia and we need to position ourselves in Australia to be a credible youth retailer."
Expansion of Glassons Australia is on the cards, while the return of Hallensteins cannot be ruled out. The men's stores left the lucky country in 2003, shutting the four stores there to concentrate on Glassons.
Quanchi says acquisitions may also be in the offing, buying good sites to rebrand as a Glassons, or a roll-out of a completely separate identity.
"The challenge is to make sure that we don't destabilise our New Zealand business and to maintain growth sales and profit here, while finding more sites going forward into Australia that suit our brand."
Australia is where it will all happen - and the board's decision to base the chief executive of a New Zealand top-50 company in Melbourne is a prudent one, says Quanchi.
Part of the problem with Glassons is its Christchurch head office.
"There's not a lot of inspiration [there], you could say. I think we need to be around our direct competitors all the time. There's far more inspiration in Australia.
"But probably more to the point, we've been treating Australia like the third cousin. It hasn't had the focus, it's always been New Zealand-focused.
"The only way we can get that focus, getting back that Australia's where our big growth is going to come from, is to be there. I think if we can give it the focus that we're giving New Zealand, there's not a problem at all."
SHAYNE QUANCHI
Hallenstein Glasson CEO.
* Education: Church of England Girls' School, Perth.
* Married to Chris Quanchi, with 26-year-old stepson Matthew and 20-year-old daughter Rebecca.
* Passions: Aussie Rules Football - an Eagles supporter - and tennis (favourite player: Lleyton Hewitt).
Career
2003-2008: Divisional business manager - Miss Shop and Young Men's (previously children's wear), Myer, Melbourne.
1997-2002: Managing director of N E Wear, an import/wholesale business she set up selling to women's brands Sportsgirl, Just Jeans, Miss Shop, Cotton On and Hot Options.
1991-1997: Buyer/product developer (women's tops), Just Jeans, Richmond.
