AFTER 115 years in the business it would be safe to assume that Cecil Bros, the family company behind the well-known Betts and Betts brand, would know shoes.
AFTER 115 years in the business it would be safe to assume that Cecil Bros, the family company behind the well-known Betts and Betts brand, would know shoes.
And so it does. But instead of resting on its laurels, the company’s board decided two years ago that its business model needed to be changed to secure the company’s future. In the process it initiated a restructure that could double its size in the not too distant future. Signs proclaiming the strategy that will take the company forward for the next 100 years adorn its head office.
Part of that restructure involves an expansion into the eastern States. The Betts Kids label will be separated from the main business, Betts and Betts will be rebranded Betts, a new brand Zu that is aimed at a newly identified market has been launched.
A major refurbishment of 90 Betts and Betts stores will also be undertaken over the next three years and the company will exit any sites that are not performing.
The board has also laid out plans to improve gross margins by re-positioning its brands into higher price ranges and through producing the majority of its product in-house.
Cecil Bros managing director Danny Breckler said the company’s market research had shown that there was a sameness among shoe retailers.
“We needed a competitive ad-vantage and the way to do that was to specialise,” he said.
“In WA we’re competing against six retailers and in the eastern States there are 15.”
Mr Breckler said six years of trials had shown that the Betts Kids brand could be run successfully and that 14 locations had been selected for the new stand-alone stores. The brand will also be expanded nationally.
“[By separating it out] we’ll be able to offer a wider range of product staffed by people that know how to care for children’s feet,” he said.
“We can do the job better by not having it in the back corner of a Betts and Betts store with a reduced range.”
Mr Breckler said the Betts re-branding was needed to help the company change the image of its stores.
For years Betts and Betts has been seen as a middle to lower-price range family shoe store and the company wants to move its image into the more mid-price, men and women’s contemporary fashion area.
The company is also going after 25 to 39-year old men and women in the ‘trendy’ fashion area – a gap it believes has been under serviced – with its new Zu brand.
Four Zu stores have been opened around Australia, including one in Karrinyup, and a further six, including one due to open in the next two weeks, will be opened by mid-August.
Mr Breckler said that 90 per cent of the Zu range was being designed in-house and made around the world. The remaining 10 per cent would come from international brands, with Diesel the main offering.
Up to 70 per cent of the company’s other two brands, Betts and Zu, will be designed in-house to complement the main national and international brands the stores carry now.
Mr Breckler said the move to source much of the product in-house was a good one because it would help improve margins and give the company greater control of its destiny.
While Cecil Bros is positioning itself for the next 100 years and is into its fifth generation of family involvement, its name may have been different if events had taken a different turn.
The company started out as a saddle repair operation on the corner of High and Market streets in Fremantle – where a Betts and Betts store now operates – and was run by Mr Breckler’s great grandfather, Cecil, who had emigrated from Russia.
However, Cecil died young, leaving behind a wife and four children. His wife, who did not have the necessary skills to continue with saddle repairs, restarted the business as a shoe store.
Her two sons, Cecil and Alec, took over the business and, as family history tells it, decided on the company’s name through the toss of a coin.
Had that coin landed differently, the company could have been known as Alec Bros, according to Mr Breckler.
He said a great deal of the company’s success had been the pride the family had taken in it and the fact that most of the family members had remained aligned to the company’s direction.
Mr Breckler said those things had been bolstered by a shift during the 1990s to manage the business as if it was a public company.
It has appointed an independent director and Mr Breckler said that, while family members were encouraged to become involved with the business, they “had to make a contribution”.
“The philosophy has changed. In the old days the family business used to be for the family and the employment of the family,” he said.
“Now the focus of the business is its profitability and returns to share-holders.
“A family business is the nicest environment when you get the formula right.”
However, he admitted there had been hiccups along the way, such as some legal action taken by family member Shirley Leshem.
The company ended up buying-out her share.
“That was dealt with and is a sign of the strength of the family,” Mr Breckler said.
