Leading New Zealand wool and possum-fibre garment producers are working together on market opportunities in Canada, the United States and Europe.
Led by Paul Spicer of outdoor clothing manufacturer Norsewear, the "cluster" involves woollen underwear producer Finespun and technical mountain bikewear specialist N-Zone. Spicer says the three will "share an umbrella - to build a new product range from the three companies' best products."
They're targeting the extreme outdoor market, "touching on fashion." The range is broad in styling and technical performance, from woollen intimate apparel and socks, to mid-layer garments and heavy outer-layer garments using wool and technical fibre inners.
The three companies couldn't be more different in terms of history and structure but the products are a near-perfect fit. Norsewear is more than 40 years old, famous for its socks and rugged hikers' jumpers and jackets. Finespun, previously Lane Walker Rudkin Manufacturing, claims to make some of the world's finest woollen fabric. N-Zone, on the other hand, is "high technology and high energy" with product and graphics based around the mountain-biking subculture.
"The group approach gives us the opportunity to share some of the volumes we wouldn't be able to do individually, or our factories would be too specific to produce individually," says Spicer. "We can't go into those markets with just apparel. We need all the other bits to go with it. We need the technical strength."
Spicer says the cluster came about as a result of meetings of the Industry New Zealand-sponsored textile, clothing and footwear strategic partnership. As convener of the market access subgroup, Spicer was impressed to meet other companies with skills and products complementary to Norsewear's. He also found that collectively, their address book listed many of the top retailers globally.
Woollen products made in New Zealand have come a long way from chunky jumpers. Norsewear, for ex-ample, is making "very technical use of merino and possum," says Spicer.
A garment may have a 20.5-micron merino wool outer and a superfine 18-micron merino/possum inner in contrasting colours and may be black on the outside and natural possum on the inside, giving it "an amazing thermal quality but also adding a lot of style by the way of contrast colours." Though not as technical as some of the wools Norsewear produces with high-tech inners, like Coolmax, it is "a very technical product," Spicer says. "It has got a bit of an edge to it. [It's] not just a tourist product."
The three companies' collaboration gives a large combined contingent of product and graphic designers. "I think we've got a heap of talent there," says Spicer. "We're cross-referencing on product development with one another's ranges as to what we think collectively is going to work." Spicer says he's confident of some "quick wins" for the group, already with strong leads to follow up, particularly chain stores in Britain, Canada and the US. He doesn't rule out working under a single brand some time in the future.
