3 million shoes sold, in 60 countries, and almost 100 million euros of estimated sales in 2020, those are the number summarizing VEJA’s success.
VEJA is a French brand created in 2004, that disrupted the sneakers market, first at a domestic level, and now internationally through their ethical standpoint. VEJA shoes are manufactured in Brazil through an entirely environmentally responsible process, fair trade, and raw materials from organic farming.
One of the key elements of VEJA’s success is its powerful storytelling ability.
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Since their creation, VEJA mastered the ability to tell a story through all their mediums and get the audience interested. This story will impact customers’ perception of the brand and create brand awareness. We are hardwired for stories. When you meet someone new, you tell your story, and they tell theirs. That is how you connect with someone. Brand do the same with storytelling: they make customers relate to their brand through their story. Moreover, stories can be 22x more memorable. It is a great way to make a real impact on your audience.
VEJA’s story writes itself. The brand was founded by 2 French men Sebastian Kopp and François-Ghislain Morillion. In 2003, the two men were doing audits for some multinationals’ investment in sustainability, when they visited a factory in China. At first, the factory looks clean. But when they pushed the tightly closed door of the workers’ living areas’, they realized that the clothes worn all over the world were made by workers living in inhuman situations. Soon after, they orientated their careers towards socially and ecologically conscious companies and started working at AlterEco, the first French fair-trade brand. Through AlterEco they knew that fair-trade is not just a myth but is economically possible. Knowing that they decided to reinvent a symbol of their generation and a product of mass consumption: sneakers. They realized that 70% of the cost of a pair of brand-name shoes goes into marketing. This means that cutting marketing costs will allow them to sell five times more expensive shoes at the same price as big brands. To make their vision come true, they went to Brazil, a country gathering all the resources they need to create VEJA. They worked closely with local producers to make sure to create a positive impact on the environment and society in every step of the manufacturing process. The rest is history.
VEJA ticked all the boxes for a successful storytelling. First, they focused on customer need. In the early 2000s brands were only talking about sustainability but not acting on it. Customer were already looking for ethical brands and that is what VEJA’s story is all about. Second, they evoked emotions. They connected with customers through empathy and compassion for workers living in inhuman situations. Third, they leveraged several mediums to tell their story. The “Project” tab of their website is an interactive page that allows users to listen to VEJA’s detailed story narrated by the two founders. VEJA’s communication puts its founders at the center of its story. Moreover, users can also scroll through the different “Chapters” of the brand’s story such as “Cotton”, “Upcycling” or even “No ads”. This goes to show how transparent VEJA is with their customers and strengthen their storytelling by making it credible. Sebastian Kopp and François-Ghislain Morillion gave a lot of interviews since the beginning of their success, available on YouTube, which helps create a more personal relationship with customers. Video marketing is also a powerful tool, that VEJA leveraged through their 10min video called “The VEJA story”.
One of the main differentiation factors of VEJA is the brand’s choice of not investing in marketing. This means VEJA is also partly relying on word of mouth as a storytelling medium.
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