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Arrow is a shirt brand that's more than a century-and-a-half old, a profitable testament to the power of focus, and it never forgets what it stands for. "Trust," as voiced by Ian Ross, president, Cluett International, on a recent trip to Delhi. It started in 1851, making cuffs and collars for the first 50 years, and now has licensees selling the brand in some 90 countries. To many across the world, and to generation after generation, it is the original American shirt. Clothing that's expected to remain part of your wardrobe as long as you'd like, wear after wear, wash after wash---never rendered unwearable by the vagaries of fashion. Arrow has had a clearly focused identity: as the shirt that set the standards of proper gentlemanly attire. A brand with integrity. And with a voice of authority on such matters as cuff-length and collar flexibility. On technical innovations too, the brand has been a clear leader: whether it's wrinkle-resistant or anti-bacterial fabric. "You can't have a brand that has survived all these years if it's not genuine," says Ross, evidently proud of Arrow's heritage. Yet, Arrow is no longer the top shirt brand in the US. It is third, after Van Heusen and Ralph Lauren's Polo. What has intervened? Fashion. Even for male attire of the most formal kind. More importantly, the casual wave. And Arrow finds itself confronted by questions of brand identity. Arrow Sport is now its hottest sub-brand, globally, outselling Arrow Classic in market after market. Ross is clear that the company has no intention to set fashion trends, so long as it is savvy enough to pick up what's moving and work with that; local-market licensees have the freedom to pick their own designs and styles within a strict set of parameters. This has been the market's trend: away from plain white or single-colour shirts. Casualwear, in fact, now accounts for over half of Arrow's retail sales globally. According to Janak Dave, who heads the business for the Indian licensee Arvind, the casual story is no different in India. The showroom display's appeal has sharpened, as the sales figures indicate. But it seems to have come at the cost of brand focus. Is it this or is is that? Is it formal or casual? Is it the stuff of convention or fashion? To complicate matters further, the brand has entered womenswear in several markets (notably, France). So what is Arrow anyhow? The short answer is that Arrow, after more than a century of being the classic shirt, now represents an entire quiverful of products. And while it seems somewhat confused---here for a moment, there the next---there is also the possibility that all the apparently divergent sub-brands will align themselves in formation to form a large Arrow that's even more powerfully focused. On playing the trustworthy agent of convergence in a market of apparent divergences. As Ross says, it's still about trust, an everlasting attribute.
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'Ne
obliviscaris'. Sounds like some weird species on Discovery channel, but to
a niche audience of clannishly few numbers, that's what wave-patterns its
way through the head on seeing someone in a Campbell tartan shirt. It
means 'never forget' to anyone with any connection to the Campbell clan
from the Scottish highlands.