Someone who may be familiar to retailers in the industry is now serving as SVP of Dakine.
Pamela Levine worked as a Roxy sales executive during her career, in addition to working with yoga and sports apparel brands such as Manduka and 2XU.
Marquee Brands, which acquired Dakine at the end of 2018, hired Pamela to manage several aspects of the Dakine business. Marquee also owns Body Glove, in addition to BCBG, Ben Sherman and Bruno Magli, among other brands. The private equity firm Neuberger Berman sponsors Marquee.
Pamela answered a few questions for SES about her career path and what she is working on at Dakine.
Tell us a little bit about your background in the surf and active industries.
Pamela Levine: With a background in sports marketing, I started my career at IMG and Disney handling sponsorships and quickly transitioned to the sponsor side, managing sports marketing for the leading footwear brand, Saucony.
At Saucony, I found myself more excited about selling product and working with customers at our expo booth rather than spending time at the race finish line, so it was an obvious transition for me to move to sales management.
I’ve been lucky enough over the last 20 years to be surrounded by great founders, mentors, teams, and retailers to lead some best-in-class brands in health, wellness, and action sports such as Manduka (yoga), 2XU (compression sports apparel) and, of course, Roxy.
People may be changing their purchasing behaviors, but ultimately consumers want to support great brands and be part of communities bigger than themselves. Stewarding those brands in each community they serve is an amazing responsibility and journey.
How did you end up at Marquee Brands? What is your role there?
Pamela Levine
Pamela Levine: Through mutual friends, I met the leadership team at Marquee and Neuberger Berman and I was immediately attracted to the talent and consumer mindset they held.
At a time where some brands have a fearful retail outlook, Marquee was thinking about investing in brand expansion for the long term, focusing on sustainable brand health.
As the SVP of Dakine, I’m now managing the brand’s marketing efforts (for all genders and categories), DTC retail experience and licensed partners.
(Editor’s note: Dakine recently signed a new licensing partner for all apparel, including sport performance, lifestyle, outerwear and swim – Hong Kong-based Global Brands Group (GBG), a spinoff of sourcing giant Li & Fung.)
What are some ways that Marquee helps the brands it acquires?
Pamela Levine: Marquee is focused on team, product, and retail consumer experiences through all channels to amplify the brand message – website, social, events, PR, wholesale and pop-up retail experiences.
The teams are focused on developing appropriate product categories and elevating the brand story through all mediums, such as testing new product extensions through brand pop-up shops or leading consumer marketing efforts to drive traffic to our wholesale partners.
You can think of Marquee as the centralized hub for product go-to-market consumer strategy and the direct-to-consumer experience.
You have a lot of background in the women’s market. Do you see more opportunity for Dakine to expand its women’s apparel business and if so, how?
Pamela Levine: Dakine has a long history in supporting women’s initiatives and product stories. Our goal is to amplify those stories moving ahead.
In Spring 2020, we have two signature hardgoods and apparel collections with progressive riders Casey Brown and Kassia Meador who helped create purpose-built gear for mountain biking and surf travel, respectively.
In snow, with great riders such as Jamie Anderson, Jill Perkins, and Taylor Lundquist, outerwear has been a category focus that we saw resonate at retail last year and will continue to be built upon in seasons ahead.
The athletes trust Dakine and we need to keep driving all categories for women through better fabrics, fit, and purpose-built product for the water to the mountain and the lifestyle in between.
