We have been hearing good things about Lira’s women’s business lately.
Retailers especially like two things about the brand: they are fast to market with monthly deliveries, and they offer fashion at a good price.
We checked in with the Lira team to find out more. National Sales Manager Brian Barlow and others on the team answered our questions.
What does the distribution for Lira Girl look like?
Lira Team: The Lira Girl covers a couple of markets, which makes the brand unique.
We initially started out in surf and we do sell to key surf retailers on both coasts. We also have an awesome distribution of boutique retailers across the United States and Canada that do really well with the brand and continue to come back each season.
In addition, we work with select key major retailers that cover our big box business. Nordstrom has been one of those great larger retailers that have been awesome to work with and they love what we are doing as a brand.
How is the women’s business doing? What is the outlook for the upcoming season?
Lira Team: Business has been great. We had a good Summer ‘18 season and we have just wrapped up Fall ’18, where we saw decent growth and good sell-through at retail.
Standout categories have been jumpsuits, sweaters, and dresses. We are now in the middle of Holiday ’18 and are excited to see what performs for the season.
For Spring ’19, our collection mixes textured fabrics, fun spring stripes, and custom prints that pair back to our swim collection.
How has the women’s line evolved in the past couple of years?
Lira Team: The women’s market is ever-changing. Over the last couple of years, we have moved to a collection-based delivery where we offer a fresh delivery every month.
This move has been great for us because we always have new styles delivering to retailers, which gives them a fresh assortment for their customers.
It has been a bit more to manage on the production side but has improved our business tremendously.
Tell us more about how you are able to pull off monthly deliveries.
Lira Team: Our manufacturers are great partners with the brand. We made the change to the monthly delivery system in Spring 2017.
We had already been offering two collections each season, but after listening to our retailers, we moved to a three-collection delivery format.
The format has been good for us and has allowed us to keep a steady stream of product hitting our accounts each month.
Moving to this format has been a bit more work on our small team. However, we have come together to make this happen. Everyone from design, production, and sales all work together to be on the same page each month.
There are a lot of moving pieces but somehow it all comes together.
How has the swim business gone for Lira lately?
Lira Team: Swim has been another standout for us, similar to what we have going on with apparel.
Our collections are simple and tight. We only offer a Spring 2/1 delivery and Summer 4/1 delivery.
What sets us apart from other brands is our price points. Retailers are typically blown away by our pricing. We feel that our girl wants versatility. So if she can walk away with both a two-piece and one-piece for under $150 we know she will be happy with her purchase.
We see amazing opportunity in swim and will continue to push forward in this category.
