The move to produce & promote sustainable products, has fast become a unique selling proposition for brands the world over (and so it should). However, for one swiss bag producer the notion of sustainability and leveraging their brand from that fact, is nothing new.
Freitag has been producing designer bags made from recycled truck tarpaulins and seat belts for 14 years, originally created by two brothers: Markus and Daniel Freitag; the product line has caught the attention of young individualists the world over.
The brand has been managed internally, since the late ’90s, hiring managers internally to take care of sales distribution and marketing. The Freitag brothers have always had excellent instincts, surrounding themselves with people whose ideals and skills complement their own - and who put their hearts and souls into beating the drum for the Freitag philosophy. They comment: “As with most new businesses, growth during our first seven years was creative - and a bit chaotic,” says Streuli of the then young company. “Inquiries came in from abroad, and we did our best to respond to them. What was good about this non-strategy was that we achieved a high degree of awareness incredibly quickly.”
This non-strategic growth also had its drawbacks, according to Markus & Daniel: Freitag bags started turning up in shops that did the company’s image more harm than good, explains Braunschmidt. If it was to get back to its original values, there had to be a rethink in the marketing department. “Our customers are discriminating, engaged individuals of all ages, interested not just in the product but also in its quality and history,” says Braunschmidt. “So we carefully analyzed our distribution channels, only supplying shops that met certain criteria. They had to stock the right brands, and they needed motivated sales staff with a talent for advising customers. Freitag products, because they are made from recycled materials, look old even when they’re new, and that needs explaining.” Retailers alone can create brand charisma purely by the way the products are displayed. This is shown by the example of Italy, where Freitag bags, with their used-look, rub shoulders with brands like Gucci and Prada. Freitag’s most persuasive marketing tool remains the product itself.
One of the major coups for the company was when the curators of the Museum of Modern Art in New York noticed the genius of the environmentally correct, distinctive designs of Freitag and featured one of its bags in its design gallery when it reopened in 2004.
“We don’t spend a cent on classical advertising. We restrict ourselves to events, point-of-sale activities and sales support,” says Braunschmidt of the company’s marketing strategy. “Online marketing is becoming more and more important too, and quite a lot of people only make purchases on the Web site, and not in stores. We therefore apply stringent efficiency criteria to any marketing activity we consider.” Whatever marketing measure the company decides on, it always sticks faithfully to the Freitag credo: loving attention to detail. For example, a photograph is taken of every bag produced, then attached to it with a description of how that particular model came about.
Freitag Brothers History
In 1993 Markus and Daniel Freitag, both graphic designers, were looking for a suitable material for their bag designs. Inspired by the heavy-goods traffic thundering past their Zurich apartment overlooking the autobahn, they made a bag from old truck tarps, bicycle-tire inner tubes and seat belts, thus triggering a new trend in the world of handbags. They sewed the first models in their living room. Today the bags come into being just down the road, in the 2,800-square-meter workshop of what used to be the Maag gearwheel factory in the former industrial sector of the city, which now is a trendy quarter with a vibrant nightlife. Today, about 50 designs are made at this factory. In addition to the three Freitag flagship shops in Zurich, Davos and Hamburg, the products are on sale in over 350 shops worldwide.
