SOCK TALK: BALENZIA WALKS THEBRAND LICENSING WAY
How has been the journey of Balenzia so far?
Balenzia is a decade-old socks’ brand. Given that the market was very price-sensitive and not very brand-conscious back
then, we never pushed a lot. Howeer, in the last couple of years we have seen the market evolving really fast and that
has prompted us to give a significant push to the brand Balenzia. We are considering the brand as a startup. In the online space we are probably the number one brand on Amazon, etc. We have been very aggressive online because it is easier to build a presence online than offline, the latter being time-consuming. Offline we are still trying to connect with the market. We
are present at all the leading portals, including Jabong, Snapdeal, Amazon, and others, along with our own portal.
 
Could you share details about your licensing agreement with Turner?
We have taken the license for Justice League and it is really intriguing as it has DC Comics superhero team right from Superman to Batman, The Flash to Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman to Aquaman. We love this partnership as
it has given us a lot of new opportunities to target youth audiences in a prolific manner. 
 
How have you zeroed upon the target group for the licensed range?
Not restricting this IP to kids, we have tried to cater to a wider age group through this collection. We have launched an entire range under this license, which is valid for a tenure of three years. We have kept the pricing very aggressive and each pair starts from Rs 129.
 
According to you, what is the trick to licensing?
I think it entirely depends on the licensees and how well they derive the DNA of the licensed IP. If done right, IPs can work wonders for licensees, depending on how they implement the license.
 
What made you consider brand licensing as an effective retail strategy?
Socks as a category is very nascent in India and disorganised at the same time with just a handful of major players. In such a scenario, it is important for us to stand out and break through the clutter and that is where brand licensing is helping us. What
we aspired was to come up with a starkly different product. And the licensing deal has helped us do so. Moreover, there wasn’t
a brand loyalty for socks, which we saw as an opportunity.

 

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