COVA was on the hunt for a strategic investor in 2019. A lot’s changed since then.
The brand was shelved in 2019 and co-founder Kent Stevens went on to do consulting work. Two years ago, Stevens struck up a conversation with executives at Jantzen Brands – owner of its namesake swimwear label, along with Cosita Linda, Phax, and Elemar. In April, the two parties finalized a deal whereby Jantzen now owns COVA and Stevens serves as its general manager and head of sales.
“When we got up to the pandemic, for some categories it was helpful. Hardgoods in particular,” Stevens recalled. “But for soft goods, a lot of us struggled. We ended up shelving the brand and through a series of events, I ended up with the IP. I wasn’t really sure what I was going to do with it, to be honest, but we didn’t do anything terribly wrong. We had nice product. We delivered on time. We kept our distribution clean. We just ran out of gas.”
COVA in 2019 was distributed in about 250 stores throughout North America, mostly specialty with a limited footprint in majors such as Macy’s and Nordstrom.
The brand, which Stevens started with Guy Stagman, was created to fill a niche in the market for the older men’s surf customer, utilizing the pair’s former experience heading up Quiksilver’s Waterman Collection. Stevens and Jantzen aren’t looking to reinvent the wheel and take the brand in a new direction from its roots. Instead, the label, now called COVA by Jantzen, has the backing of a larger parent with people handling functions, such as marketing, tech, and customer service, allowing for Stevens to focus purely on growing the product and distribution.
“With this new partnership with Jantzen, we have so much more available to us,” Stevens said. “The nice thing about Jantzen is that they’re not so big that a small brand like COVA would get lost in the shuffle. But, on the other hand, they’re not so small that I’m doing a lot of the things that I wasn’t built to do.”
Working alongside Stevens is Amy McPhillips, COVA’s head designer and merchandiser, who has worked at industry brands such as Lost and Huk.
COVA wovens are a big area of focus for the brand. With COVA now part of Jantzen, it has access to the company’s print archives. The center design in the photo above, called “Zen Garden,” is one of those prints. Photo courtesy of COVA.
Channel Playbook
The line, in comparison to what it was previously, is edited with an emphasis on wovens, some bottoms, swimwear, and a few T-shirts. They’ll introduce fleece and jackets seasonally for fall/holiday.
COVA will have its own booth space at the upcoming Surf Expo in January, showing fall 2024, in addition to what’s left of the spring line.
So far, Stevens has gone back to familiar faces for COVA, getting it into retailers such as Glik’s, Sun Diego, Hansen Surfboards, Hobie Sports, Rusty Del Mar, Quiet Storm, Aqua East, Blueline, Innerlight, Ocean Hut, Island Pursuit, Chauncey’s, Salty Dog Surf Shop in Ormand Beach, and Old Naples Surf Shop.
At least initially, the distribution plan will be to focus on what is most familiar to the brand: surf. However, it also resonates in outdoor and resort. In fact, distribution was headed down that path in Cova’s first run.
“In a perfect world, we’d like to have an even mix of outdoor, surf, and resort. Initially (distribution) will be driven by people that we’ve done business with previously, which were largely from surf. But, regardless of channel, we’re focused on specialty,” Stevens said. “Our plan is modest for 2024 and 2025, so there’s not a ton of pressure to go to some of the larger players. We can get to where we want to be between specialty in those three areas and our own online business, which is planned to be a full price business.”
COVA will show its fall 2024 line at the upcoming Surf Expo. Photo courtesy of COVA.
“All Plays on the Table”
While COVA is a men’s brand, Jantzen’s strength is in women’s swim.
Internally, there’s been some discussion around whether COVA could serve as a vehicle for Jantzen to get into the women’s sportswear space. No serious moves have been made on that front, but “all plays are on the table,” Stevens said of where the brand could go.
“We feel like the name and what we’re doing is elastic and could work in that (women’s) area. If you look at the Jantzen swim customer, it’s very much aligned with our customer on the male side,” Stevens pointed out. “There are people out there that feel like that same opportunity we see in men’s, that white space, does exist for women’s, too.”
That hole in the competitive landscape and market disruption makes for an opportune time for COVA to be revving up.
Not unlike other brands in the market, there’s what Stevens sees as “seismic” shifts taking place in the industry that are giving the opportunity for some companies to nab more share. Plus, the gap the brand was built around makes COVA as relevant as it was when Stevens and Stagman launched it.
“With everything that’s going on with some of the heritage brands coming under new ownership and different (business) models, we feel like that same white space wedged between young men’s and higher-end men’s brands is still there,” Stevens said. “The same guy that grew up with action sports brands has a different fit need and is doing different things in his life that require a bit more elevated product line. We don’t see that need as having changed at all.”
