Modern Fashion: Louis Joseph Of Alps & Meters On The 5 Things You Need To Lead a Successful Fashion Brand Today
An Interview With Candice Georgiadice
Team & Network: Fashion is one of the oldest forms of collaboration and assembling a team of passionate Co-Founders I have found to be a key success factor. Likewise, ensuring a broad network of supporters and advisors who can help guide a brand’s creative endeavors while also establishing glide paths of awareness and distribution development will help to bring more rapid ignition to the brand & concept even when operating at a modest scale. Truly, in my experience, one cannot be conducting enough conversations and network nodes; this is time consumptive for certain but many positive networking results are long-tail in nature and aggressively building one’s internal and external rolodex is an investment that will pay dividends across the various stages of fashion venture development.
Many in the fashion industry have been making huge pivots in their business models. Many have turned away from the fast fashion trend. Many have been focusing on fashion that also makes a social impact. Many have turned to sustainable and ethical sourcing. Many have turned to hi tech manufacturing. Many have turned to subscription models. What are the other trends that we will see in the fashion industry? What does it take to lead a successful fashion brand today?
In our series called, “5 Things You Need To Lead a Successful Fashion Brand Today” we are talking to successful leaders of fashion brands who can talk about the Future of Fashion and the 5 things it takes to lead a successful fashion brand in our “new normal.”
As a part of this series I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Louis Joseph.
With 25 years of brand strategy, product design, and general management experience, Louis has a reputation for global entrepreneurship, creative innovation, imaginative marketing, and multi-million dollar P&L responsibility.
Louis is currently CEO of Alps & Meters, a luxury alpine sportswear brand, which he Founded & launched in 2018.
Prior to making the transition to full time entrepreneur, Louis spent three and half years as Global Director of Strategy and Innovation at Kering/PUMA SE where he reported to Kering’s COO and PUMA’s CEO. As a key member of the executive ranks, Louis’s time and energy were centered upon the production of “big ideas”, transformational brand-product concepts, and consumer experience across Kering/PUMA’s multiple commercial divisions and disciplines.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood “backstory”?
I was born in Santa Monica, California but was raised in Massachusetts by parents from a blue collar city called Brockton. My father was a first generation American whose parents immigrated to the U.S. from Albania and my mother has a Lebanese heritage. I was extremely fortunate to be raised in an upper middle class home whose values were very much informed by my parents work ethic and general belief in the American dream. Another aspect of my childhood which many find unique is that I am one of 4 brothers comprising two sets of twins; my twin and I are fraternal twins while my younger brothers are identical twins. Such an environment made for a wonderfully rambunctious atmosphere that was full of sport, friendly competitiveness, and camaraderie.
Can you tell us the story about what led you to this particular career path?
My professional career began during the early & development stages of the New Balance Athletic Shoe Brand of Boston, MA. 21 at the time, I was accepted by New Balance as a Marketing Intern and was kindly taken under the wing of the owner, Jim Davis, his Chief Marketing Officer Paul Heffernan, Head of International Catherine Jakaitis, and the wonderful group of Category Brand Managers including lifelong friends Steve David and Craig Heisner. The immediate mentorship and coaching I received from the New Balance family provided a lot of professional tailwinds which helped me sail into the PUMA/Kering organization thereafter where I contributed to Product-Marketing, Strategy, & Innovation in many arenas across Kering’s luxury & sportswear portfolio. My luxury learnings at Kering coupled with my passion for alpine sport eventually converged to conceptualize the Alps & Meters brand concept. Centered on a mission to uphold the classic traditions of alpine sport, Alps & Meters brand architecture, values, and business model were certainly influenced by my early career stints as well as my lifelong love of skiing and life in the mountains.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
One of the aspects of my career that I have most appreciated is the global nature of the brands & business with whom I’ve been associated. Since my first foray into the sportswear and fashion arenas I have been blessed to have traveled throughout the world meeting a host of interesting people with whom I worked directly or indirectly nearly all of which I still count to this day as friends. Working with fast paced and ambitious organizations most certainly created a bond that transcended nationality and language. To this day I recall spending months at a time in Europe, Asia, and South America and in each setting, the stories that unfolded enriched my life personally and professionally. When in Europe for a time I met the world’s most famous soccer player Pele; in Brazil I connected with the country’s most famous Jujitsu athletes; during a period in London my creative teammates and I collaborated with fashion icon Alexander McQueen, and when with PUMA, I had the opportunity to interact with Olympic 100 & 200 meter champion Usain Bolt. Looking back I recognize how fortunate I have been to experience these exciting moments and when I think about the future of my career I’m eager to remain centered upon what helped to deliver those interactions; hard work, a global mindset, professionalism, and kindness.
You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
Reflecting on my own personal make-up, I believe that the following characteristics and learnings have positively influenced my leadership style….1). Adopting & maintaining a beginner’s mentality…2). Authenticity … 3). Grittiness. This trifecta of qualities I believe ensures a humble and real approach to leadership with an ability to navigate challenges and difficulties that inevitably arise with a firm resolve and long-term outlook. From my experience, adopting a beginner’s mentality helps to avoid decision-making bias while opening a wide aperture of possible solutions that can be provided from a set of alternative, and sometimes unobvious perspectives which is terribly important when innovating. Likewise, being one’s authentic self creates trust and in a start-up environment such bonds are critical for culture development. Honesty is the fuel of motivation and as a believer in servant leadership, I feel that sharing aspects of my own vulnerability is a means of flattening an organization while further empowering teammates to help drive the brand & business forward. Lastly, grittiness is inherent in all entrepreneurs and displaying and embracing such qualities builds an institutional fortitude that builds significant and nearly bullet-proof strength over time. Having navigated the recent and ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the team at Alps & Meters was especially full of grit and it is this quality beyond all others that has helped the venture climb to new heights despite stiff headwinds within the macro environment in which we are operating.
What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?
Alps & Meters’ mission is to uphold the classic traditions of alpine sport. We believe that our company’s mission and purpose manifests itself in a deeply emotional manner that connects our community to the origins, romance, and nostalgia of skiing’s past. In many ways, our product provides the most clear expression of our traditional values. Each piece is designed to fuse classic garment construction techniques, natural materials, and contemporary technologies to deliver handsome alpine sportswear that is tailored, technical, and timeless.
Do you have a favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share a story of how that was relevant to you in your life?
My grandfather was an Albanian immigrant and my father a first generation American named after the President at the time of his father’s arrival to Ellis Island in the USA, Teddy Roosevelt. Before marrying, my mother and father grew up in a blue collar city in Massachusetts called Brockton. More so than any particular quotation, their work ethic, fortitude, and gritty spirit has greatly influenced my general attitude while also helping me to maintain a sound perspective about the good fortune I have found within my career to date. Within my family we often talk of an “immigrant’s mindset” which I feel encompasses an interest to blaze new trails, to realize family oriented long-term goals, and to strive and to always do one’s very best work. It is this particular “life lesson” that has been front and center during my childhood, adolescence, and which helps to inform and guide the winding professional path which I have walked since beginning my career 25 years ago.
Ok, thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the primary focus of our interview. Do you see any fascinating developments emerging over the next few years in the fashion industry that you are excited about? Can you tell us about that?
While I am quite an analog soul, I do have a deep curiosity about how virtual reality will come to impact the fashion industry. The applications of this particular technology are wide ranging and can influence aspects of sustainability (think about trying garments on virtually without the need for physical product production), shopping (lower carbon footprint without the need for cumbersome shop as well as the enhance ability for universal peer-to-peer interaction on the “shop floor”) and the creative possibilities to push the boundaries of what fashion is and what it means to audiences around the world.
Can you share how your brand is helping to bring goodness to the world?
In an effort to uphold the classic traditions of alpine sport, Alps & Meters is focused upon the following Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) initiatives: 1). The ongoing development of the brand’s Mountain Memories Upcycled Product Collection designed in partnership with Tersus Solutions of Denver, CO, a sophisticated sustainability engine focused upon the re-use of R&D waste and re-commerce aimed at extending product life cycles while reducing the environmental impact of high frequency apparel consumption…2). Within the social arena, Alps & Meters is working hard to build a clear DEI (Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion) roadmap and has embraced partnership with the Share Winter Organization whose mission is to provide winter sport access to under-resourced youth….4). From a Governance perspective the brand and its Board of Directors have, since inception, practiced conscious capitalism with the aim of ensuring a virtuous cycle of benefits among all connected company stakeholders including both internal personnel and external vendors.
Can you share with our readers about the ethical standards you use when you choose where to source materials?
As expressed within our Corporate Responsibility Manifesto, Alps & Meters is committed to the use of natural materials such as wools and cottons. When harvested properly, these materials can be developed into garments that minimize ecological impact. When choosing our partners such as Allied Down, UPW Yarns, Botto Guiseppe Crade-to-Cradle cashmere, and British Millerain, Alps & Meters seeks suppliers who can supply raw materials that are obtained according to our values. While Alps & Meters dreams of operating on a global scale in the future, due to our boutique size at the moment our company aims to leverage supplier innovations to improve our methods of making while mitigating as much as possible environmental impact.
Fast fashion has an advantage, that it is affordable for most people, but it also has the drawback that it does not last very long and is therefore not very sustainable. What are your thoughts about this? How does your company address this question?
Alps & Meters intention is to build the highest quality alpine sport garments that command timeless durability such that the pieces may be handed down from one generation to the next. Our company is firm believers in a “less is more” attitude and such philosophy is reflected in our very tight & scarce product assortment and drive for maximum quality and durability. Creatively, our brand believes firmly in designing garments that are built such that the pieces become a kind of memory keeper for our client that will house the embellishment of wear, travel, recreation, and experience for multiple years on end. Alps & Meters prides itself on delivering such comprehensive sturdiness and long-term reliability as a manifestation of our mission, love of tradition, and effort to deliver a positive promise of first class craftsmanship for our worldwide clientele.
Thank you for all that. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Lead a Successful Fashion Brand”. Please share a story or example for each.
From my point of view, the 5 things you need to lead a successful fashion brand are as follows:
- Purpose: the inherent reason that the company exists and mission that permeates every facet of the organization. At Alps & Meters our purpose is to uphold the classic traditions of alpine sport and this intention may found in our products, story-telling, culture, and partnerships
- Authenticity: a clear and differentiated point of view about the world and how you would like to create an impact. Amidst an ever faster, more technologically advanced way of life, Alps & Meters is interested to embrace the simplicity and traditions associated with alpine sport and life in the mountains. In some ways we think of our brand in a “farm-to-table” manner by revisiting and reintroducing classic methods of making while distilling a narrative focused upon simpler times and the generational
- Imagination & Insight: a mix of imagination and foresight makes for a powerful one-two punch when aiming to brand build within the fashion sector. Harnessing the idea of a brand, bringing it to life in myriad ways from product creation to content to distribution is obviously a creative and somewhat artistic endeavor, but calibrating the concept of the company with foresight surrounding unarticulated market needs and opportunities is an essential aspect of success. In the tech sector, this is called “product-market fit” and while need states of the consumer market place are likely not as linear as they are in tech, the needs nonetheless exist and are often emotional in nature. When leaping to build a fashion brand it is just as important to ensure that the water is deep enough to take the plunge and this act of entrepreneurial faith when married with a consumer driven insight is often the recipe for long-term success rather than a one hit wonder.
- Team & Network: Fashion is one of the oldest forms of collaboration and assembling a team of passionate Co-Founders I have found to be a key success factor. Likewise, ensuring a broad network of supporters and advisors who can help guide a brand’s creative endeavors while also establishing glide paths of awareness and distribution development will help to bring more rapid ignition to the brand & concept even when operating at a modest scale. Truly, in my experience, one cannot be conducting enough conversations and network nodes; this is time consumptive for certain but many positive networking results are long-tail in nature and aggressively building one’s internal and external rolodex is an investment that will pay dividends across the various stages of fashion venture development
- Conviction: Maintaining conviction for the brand building effort after the shine of inception has worn off is difficult but essential. There will be failures and disruptions and as we’ve learned when navigating the pandemic, significant headwinds out of the Founding Team’s control. Holding on to the creative conviction, insight, and purpose of the brand is a challenge and most especially because there is certainly not a shortage of opinions from tastemakers and influencers regarding which brands are hot and which are not. Nevertheless, commanding a long-term view of the brand building exercise and recognizing that the entity is only ever just a work-in-progress will allow fashion entrepreneurs to maintain a course of “true north” while steering the ship toward changes and opportunities that might more succinctly align the brand to its existing and new clientele.
Every industry constantly evolves and seeks improvement. How do you think the fashion industry can improve itself? Can you give an example?
Two areas that excite me about improvements within the Fashion sector are democratization and sustainability. Democratization is the idea that fashion is influenced from the “bottom-up” and not the “top down.” More than ever, across industries the consumer commands great control and most especially with spending power which can be directed to brands which align with their personal makeup, values and ethical demands. Sustainability continues to be a work-in-progress but consciousness of the fashion industry’s ecological impact have never been higher nor has the pace of innovation which includes legitimate science steering toward carbon neutrality, biodegradable & recycled initiatives, along with greater respect for extended and closed-loop lifecycle management of which the combination immediate upcycling & re-commerce activities hold great promise.
You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
As an entrepreneur, if I could start a movement it would be to advocate for universal and paid apprenticeships for high school and post-high school students as an alternative to college. A version of 21st century apprenticeships would allow individuals to enter the paid working world across all fields (the arts, technology, marketing, traditional CPG, etc) in a manner that would foster continuous and practical learning while initiating financial independence in contrast to the significant debt which has saddled a generation of college students and families.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
Readers may always learn of new initiatives and content at www.alpsandmeters.com New stories, publications partnerships may be discovered within the Journal, Podcast, and About the Brand section of the website.
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.
Modern Fashion: Louis Joseph Of Alps & Meters On The 5 Things You Need To Lead a Successful… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.