Gothenburg – home to iconic denim

A pleasant but unassuming little passageway in the centre of Gothenburg is home to one of the world's hottest denim companies, Nudie Jeans. A casual passer-by would never be able to guess what hides behind the worn brick façade.
  
Despite Nudie's massive success on the international denim market, its modest premises in a charmingly scruffy building from the turn of the century, give a fairly humble impression. However, the search for new business premises is in full swing. But leaving Gothenburg is not an option for Nudie.
 
Chairman of Nudie Jeans, Joakim Levin, explains: "We have our lives here and don't socialise with the fashion industry in Stockholm anyway. So why would we move?"
 
He is bouncing around the overcrowded premises, in search of free space where we can have a chat. All the employees are young and jeans-clad. Not a suit in sight. We take a seat in a couple of comfortable armchairs, covered in denim of course!
 
An overview of the Nudie Jeans success story:
 
Maria Levin originally ran the company as a side project together with Joakim, but was employed by the American jeans manufacturer, Lee. She was their head designer, with Europe as her workplace. The people at Lee did what they could to keep Maria, but she wanted something different. She eventually left for good and put all her efforts into Nudie.
 
The timing was perfect, according to Joakim Levin. The state of the economy worked to their advantage, the denim industry had stagnated and was completely dominated by a few giant companies. From a creative point of view there was a lot to do, but no one was doing it. And Maria, who had got to know the industry from the inside, felt this acutely. This was the starting point in the early 2000s, when they first began seriously investing in Nudie.
  
"Many people have missed the most important factor behind Nudie's success," explains Joakim. "When we started, we based our business concept on an idea, an attitude. There was no readymade plan for how we would succeed. We were driven by a strong vision; to make attractive jeans, products we liked ourselves, produced in a fair way and with good inter-human relations.

"The commercial powers took us completely by surprise," says Joakim.
  
Since then, this trend has continued. Today, one million pairs of jeans, with the characteristic embroidered Nudie-wave on the back pocket, are sold each year. The company employs around 100 people, with 30 in the Gothenburg office. Around 80 percent of the items sold go abroad. Next year, the turnover target is around 400 million SEK (around £39 million).
 
But the most important value of Nudie Jeans cannot be translated into money. Many businesses are envious of their strong brand, which is bursting with integrity, independence and a consistent stance in everything they do. It should also be mentioned that they spend next to nothing on marketing or advertising.
  
Nudie Jeans radiates confidence - they know what they are doing. According to Joakim, they are intentionally predictable, as they want to work on a long-term basis with both customers and suppliers. He thinks this makes Nudie strong in all its business dealings. The plan now is for the company to grow. The company is opening its own branches throughout Europe and already has a number of foreign subsidiaries.
 
Joakim says: "It's always fun to expand and we've been curious to see how far we can take this. Sometimes we have stepped on the brakes, to avoid selling out what we feel is our basic concept. We have given ourselves permission to be rigid - this is how it should be done! Our philosophy is that we want to sell as much as possible, but only if what we sell is consistent with what we stand for. If not, we'd rather leave it."
 
Nudie Jeans' position is unique in a number of ways, not least in how independent the company is. The denim giants have more or less stopped contacting the company about takeovers. They know it's futile. But when we ask Joakim Levin to describe Nudie's role in the Gothenburg fashion wonder, he is quick to tone down the company's importance.
 
"We are perhaps not a proper fashion company. We work with jeans - a bit more of a bread and butter product. You can be creative, but within fairly narrow limits. However, that is also part of the challenge. We work much more long-term, the trends don't vary as much. We keep the same products for longer periods of time. Compared to H&M, which manufactures cheap and new, we're the opposite – slow and expensive."
 
And that suits Nudie Jeans perfectly. Because if you live and work in Gothenburg, you are a long way from the fashion industry in Stockholm.
  
"There are clear advantages with being here. We are not part of the fast fashion scene in Stockholm, and that suits us, as we're not interested in trends. We work quietly and steadily, slightly below the radar. The disadvantage is obviously that you don't get noticed quite so much, even though we don't really have a problem with that. Having said that, both we and many other Gothenburg companies have proved that we are good at making our way in the world. We soon realised that there is no difference between selling to Stockholm and to London."
  
Nudie Jeans works slower, but on the other hand is building up a stable fan base, which they are obviously keen to look after. A bit like a rock band, which is something they like being likened to.
  
"We may be a stubborn company that doesn't glance at what others are doing, but I do believe that is part of our success. We like living in the second city, Gothenburg. It's a small town in many ways, but it has the advantage of a good personal contact network, with which you can achieve anything. There are so many skilled people in Gothenburg and there is a spirit of 'This is the way we do things'. To us, the only disadvantage is the lack of infrastructure. It's difficult to fly direct to many destinations. Imagine if we could fly direct to New York!"
 
Joakim does not believe it's a coincidence that fashion and textiles have become so successful in the West of Sweden. He mentions JC as a common denominator for many of the driven people who today work for companies like Monki, Weekday and Nudie.
 
"JC was a good breeding ground. It used to be a really good place to work, which attracted people with an entrepreneurial spirit. In a similar way, I believe we and our colleagues inspire others. There are quite a few small denim designers popping up at the moment. In that sense, having a cluster of fashion and textile companies is a definite advantage. I would like to see spin-offs from our company, although no-one ever leaves us."
  
Irrespective of whether anyone is leaving Nudie or not, the growth seems to be secure for the moment. No signs of a faltering market or diminishing levels of interest to be seen. But good can always get better.
  
"We can never be faster, and we will never be the flavour of the month. So what we have to do is to keep improving what we've got. Having said that, we've been doing this for ten years and can carry on doing it for another ten. Where do we go from here? We have decided to put even more emphasis on corporate social responsibility and on working for fair working conditions. We're already good at this, but we need to get even better at showing it."
 
Irrespective of what Nudie's future marketing strategy will look like, one thing is for sure. The walking advertising boards made up by people wearing Nudie's jeans will become an increasingly common sight, both in the West of Sweden and in fashion metropolises around the world.

Buy your Nudie jeans here: http://www.nudiejeans.com/storefinder

This article comes from the publication West Side Stories

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