reatives from the Northern Beaches. They had the licence for an eyewear company called Blind, and they took a stall at Sydney Fashion Week in 1999. Someone had cancelled the stall next to them, so Sydney Fashion Week asked if they wanted an extra one. They didn’t really need any more room, but they used to customise their own denim, so they brought in a bunch of their own jeans. They ended up taking all these orders for jeans, which were customised by hand, and they had to quickly find a way to make jeans that looked like the ones they had brought in.  That’s the origin of the brand. It was basically started on a whim, and I think that’s part of the magic of the brand. The founders didn’t follow the traditional fashion trends. It was really authentic and original, and I think that’s what helped them get started. Ksubi CEO Craig King. Imag: Supplied IR: How did they go from ‘accidentally selling’ a bunch of jeans at Sydney Fashion Week to building a business?  CK: The guys got rolling without a lot of background in fashion, but incredibly creative ideas. They got a lot of attention really quickly, and they got some good accounts. They continued to do things their own way, which was quite clever and brilliant. There was the famous runway show in 2001 when they released rats down the runway. They showed at London Fashion Week the following year, and they continued to do things that were stunt-driven and very clever – and come up with great product.  But when you’re growing a business, particularly an international fashion business, it’s particularly heavy on resources and cash flow. They were a victim of their own success. In 2008, they actually went into administration. A group called Bleach stepped in and picked up their debt and ran the business until 2014. All the while, General Pants was Ksubi’s biggest account, so when the second iteration of the brand ultimately went into administration in 2014, General Pants took over running the brand. I was CEO of General Pants at the time, and in 2019, we took the business independent.  IR: What was the reason for that?  CK: When we first started running the business, it wasn’t big enough or strong enough to stand on its own, so we used the backend resources of General Pants. But by 2019, it was a healthy business, and it was always the plan for it to be an independent business down the track.  IR: What are some of the key things General Pants did to revitalise the Ksubi brand after acquiring it in 2014? CK: In our first year, we sold Ksubi through General Pants to make sure we were making the jeans properly and had the design right, and so we could effectively iron out the kinks. The following year, we were ready to export the product, but when we looked at the marketplace, the brand had gone from being in the most celebrated fashion stores to being in second- or third-tier stores, so we closed wholesale internationally and decided to rebuild it in a much more tailored way – by being in only the best stores and maintaining exclusivity. And because of the backbone of General Pants, we were able to do that. It’s probably why this iteration has been more successful than previous ones, because we’ve had the resources to get there.  We also opened stand-alone stores in Los Angeles and New York in 2016 and 2017.  IR: It seems like the business is in a much better spot financially. Can you share what that looks like today?  CK: From day dot, the stores in New York and Los Angeles were quite healthy. With our wholesale business, because we went to the best retailers, we got paid on time. We did exclusive deals with Barneys, Kith and Selfridges, and we right-sized our business, so we were able to manage the cash flow much more effectively, because we had a much more structured approach.  At the same time, we rebuilt the online store, which was successful, and over the last four years, it’s grown tenfold. The direct-to-consumer part of the business is the strongest and the fastest-growing now. IR: You recently announced plans to open a number of new stores in the US, UK, and Australia, marking your return to the Australian market as a stand-alone retailer. What’s the overarching strategy behind that?  CK: The great thing about our online business is it shows where there is interest. It was clear that New York and Los Angeles were strong markets for Ksubi, but also that Miami, Chicago, and Philadelphia were very strong. It also showed that there was interest in London, so it gave us confidence.  The data shows that if you open a store in a location where you’ve already got some interest, it strengthens your sales. Our overall strategy is to build a global brand, so we want to be in gateway cities around the world. We want to be in locations where the local market can have easy access to Ksubi stores, but also where tourists can find us. We’ve got medium-term plans to get to 12 stores around the globe, which is going to extend the wholesale business, strengthen our online business, and give our customers the ability to physically go in and get the full effect of the Ksubi experience and service, as opposed to just shopping online, or going into a Saks or Nordstrom and seeing a selection. IR: What is your store experience like?  CK: We’re very much about community. You’ll find a bunch of shoppers in our stores, but you’ll also find a lot of the local crew hanging out on the couches. There are a lot of skateboarders floating around. We’ve always leaned on creatives and included them in how we’ve developed our product and our brand. We really welcome people coming in and living and breathing the physical presence of stores. We build our stores to be great places to hang out, whether it’s in a back room or downstairs in some locations. It gives us a great standing in the marketplace, it’s a good vibe for our customers and it’s a good vibe for our staff to understand whom we’re showcasing our product to and what’s turning them on.  We’re always interested in the feedback we get from stores – the hard data, obviously, but also what our store managers and salesforce are seeing on the shop floor. IR: As you say, Ksubi works closely with musicians and skaters and other people driving pop culture. What impact do you think that has on the business? CK: That was one of the key pillars of the brand from the beginning. If you’re trying to grow a brand and keep that sacred, but also grow a commercial business, you want to make sure you’re not too corporate. We’ve always leaned on creatives who have organically shown up on our radar. Hidji is one of the AWGE group’s [A$AP Rocky’s creative agency] celebrated videographers. He was a regular in the New York store, and he had some great ideas about a collaboration. Travis Scott was the third customer in our LA store. He came in and bought three pairs of jeans, so we reached out to his people and organised a collaboration with him for Coachella.  We feel like the brand is sometimes like a blank canvas. The people who have the right sort of attitude and mentality, we embrace them and see what we can come up with. As natural as that sounds, that’s really been the formula for what we’ve been doing over the last few years. IR: And in doing so, you’ve been able to reach consumers who aren’t necessarily aware of the Ksubi brand? CK: It’s 100 per cent a growth opportunity as well. When the boys started the business in 1999, there was no social media. Facebook and online sales didn’t really exist. As those elements have emerged, we have evolved with them.  I wouldn’t say that the consumer is suspicious of the brand, but they’re more familiar with personalities. The last eight years have seen the rise of the celebrity and the rise of the influencer. Working with the right people, expanding on their networks and showcasing the brand that way…it’s exciting times. How you take a product and interface with creatives to execute that and project it onto the marketplace is really the secret sauce. IR: On that note, can you talk about Ksubi 23, your list of 23 emerging artists, musicians, and athletes that you think are going to shape the next 23 years, which you launched for the 23rd anniversary of the brand? And why 23? CK: We wanted to celebrate 20 years in business, but the pandemic disrupted that. For us, a 22nd birthday didn’t have a lot of punch, but in America, a lot of people say that when you turn 23, it’s your [Michael] Jordan year. We thought that would really resonate with our audience. And we’d been wanting to celebrate how long the brand has been around and that it’s healthier than ever, so that’s how we came up with 23.  The launch was in New York on 8 September. We had 800 people at the store, spilling out onto the street. And if you look at Ksubi 23, we had several of them perform at the event. We basically threw a big party, and earlier this month, we had one in Sydney. We had more than 700 people here in our office, which is quite modular and can transition into an entertainment space or a gallery space. We call it the ‘Kstudios’. We had JID, a major rapper from the States, perform, along with a couple other people on the list. It’s about bringing the global energy that we’re creating internationally back home and making sure that the experience is truly global. IR: When do you plan to open your first Australian store?  CK: We’re still trying to find the right location. We want to be in the Melbourne and Sydney CBDs, and there’s a bit of change going on. The asking prices are still quite steep relative to what’s around the world. There’s no urgency to have the store open by a designated date, but it’s important that we find the right store, the right strip, so we’re constantly talking to landlords and we’ll find the right location when the right deal emerges.  IR: How does it feel to be opening the first Ksubi store in the Australian market in several years?  CK: The visibility of the Ksubi brand in Australia for the last seven years has really been through the lens of General Pants, and at General Pants, we’re one of 40 or 50 other brands. The breadth of our offer – the leather goods, the gold jewellery – is much more significant than a wholesale partner is ever likely to pick up.  When we were aligned with General Pants, there was no point opening any stores to compete with ourselves. Now that we’re stand-alone, it’s the right time to launch some stores, so more followers can come and see the products – from the leather jackets down to the key rings – that you don’t find in wholesale.