Despite Clason’s luxury background, the pair are always surprised to see how much brands upprice their products, relative to what the fabric costs. “We know every fabric that everybody produces, because we see them at the wash houses, and there’s a very big difference between what we take and what some of our friends in the business take,” Clason explains.
While Patriksson Keller and Clason’s approach to Jeanerica borrows learnings from European luxury houses, applied to what they see as more American ways of thinking and building, what is distinctly Scandinavian, though, is its pricing structure. Jeans range from $230 to $330. “We come from Sweden, we are the country of Ikea and H&M — and there is no coincidence that you have those brands out of Sweden, because the whole idea that everything should be for everyone is in our DNA,” says Patriksson Keller.
Keeping prices accessible has established a level of trust with their customers, the founders say, especially at a time when shoppers are questioning luxury’s steep price tags. “In the initial stage, we had a lot of buyers telling us to raise the prices,” Patriksson Keller recalls. “We said, ‘But this is a good price.’ No one says that anymore, because we’ve entered a different era.”
Even eight years into the brand, finances are tricky to balance when determining the amount of SKUs to order, ensuring minimums are fulfilled without overstocking. “If you’re looking for a perfect fit of denim, you’re not going to wait for three, four months — you need the product to always be available,” Patriksson Keller says. “That’s the tricky part, to balance the risk in it — even though we regard our business as quite little risk due to the low volume of newness or trend product.”
This is where the importance of having the right team comes in. Jeanerica’s merchandiser, a Swiss Italian man named Luigi, for instance, joined from Bottega Veneta and now determines how big collections should be and what the pricing structure should look like. Annika McVeigh, who currently works as the director of visual identity at Bottega Veneta and has worked at brands including Prada, Celine and Alaïa, also joined the board earlier this year.
As it continues on its growth path, however, instead of expanding the team, Jeanerica is investing in the consultancies it works with. Some of these include partners in Italy who can help develop new denim washes based on the design ideas of the in-house team, or others who can assist with quality control as the brand scales. “This merchandising element is not a typical Northern Europe kind of thing,” Patriksson Keller says. “It’s been adding so much to our business just to get the outside eye.”
The pair’s veteran status, alongside Stockholm’s evolution as a fashion city, is also proving helpful as they embark on Jeanerica’s international expansion. “We share quite a lot of intel with each other, which is really nice, but demands a number of years as an industry to be able to do so,” says Patriksson Keller. “We’ve been talking to a lot of the other Swedish companies about how it is to open a store in New York, for example, or in London. These will be our next venues; we haven’t decided which order yet.”
