Dora Casal (Grenchen, Switzerland, 1972) is considered the prototype of the daughter of Galician emigrants who went to work in the Swiss canton where she was born and returned so that their children could study in Spain. “Because homesickness pulls a lot,” he maintains. Casal has achieved something that, however, is not very common: being the right hand of the designer, who appointed her executive director of the fashion brand that bears her name in 2019, just before covid and experiencing a difficult situation in the sector that led to their losses.
Today Galician fashion is going through a good moment because, in his opinion, “local designers are good, there is no doubt.” “and the client perceives it. Our fashion is recognizable because there is a lot of quality behind it,” says the executive of a brand that Queen Letizia frequently wears and, lately, also her daughter, Princess Leonor, her best ambassadors, according to Casal.
Preserving quality while respecting the laws of craftsmanship and ensuring that garments last 20 years is one of the firm’s maxims, the executive repeats during the conversation. At a time when “consumption is very polarized because there has been a gap between the shopping basket and purchasing power, this polarization has also reached fashion,” he explains. “Luxury has become more luxury; The low price has made a very powerful emergence in Spain and, in the middle, we are the firms that are premium, we provide a differential product with brand recognition, an ecosystem that must be built very well for it to survive.” And they are there.
Last year was good for them, says the executive, and this year they are having “interesting” growth figures, although the most important months for the business are missing, which go from November to January. This period can represent 30% of the company’s turnover.
Roberto Verino has an atypical exercise that does not coincide with the calendar year. The last one closed, from March 2023 to February 2024, obtained a turnover of 30.37 million euros, 10.6% below that achieved the previous year (33.97 million). And this despite the fact that its sales outside Spain went from representing 8% of the total to 18%. The company left its losses in the fiscal year of 2022. “I have made profits for two consecutive years,” boasts Casal.
The executive director is not satisfied: “What I want is to sell more,” she says. And to achieve this, it has focused its strategy on three pillars. On the one hand, its objective is to rejuvenate the firm. “We have a very solid brand, with 40 years of history. But we have to attract clients of younger ages. Our client is 45 years old and older and I want the 35-year-old woman to see Roberto Verino not as her mother’s brand, but as a brand she can feel comfortable with.” Casal points out, however, that the company has a very loyal customer that, of course, it does not want to lose. “My client is the basis of the entire company,” he says. “But I do want to expand the target and to do so we will make products for younger people, communication campaigns, different digital communication…”, he explains.
On the other hand, it aims to advance in two areas: with the digitalization of the company after the emergence of artificial intelligence (“which is helping us, for example, to integrate the old knowledge of our workers with the new through gaming”) and, above all, with its internationalization, based on two markets: Mexico and Portugal.
The company is becoming strong in Mexico, a country where it already made an incursion 20 years ago and failed. On this occasion, it has gone hand in hand with the El Palacio de Hierro department store. “It was the first phase, which is already finished. “We are going to start the second, which will consist of opening the brand to other formats.” The board is considering launching its own stores, as a franchise or with collaborations. Portugal will go behind the Central American State. The firm is currently designing the growth plan in the neighboring country, where it is present through El Corte Inglés in Lisbon and Porto, and with its own stores in several shopping centers. He is still not clear what his next step will be like.
eight more than in 2023, the company intends to increase that number with between three and five stores next year. “We encourage physical contact with the client. That salesperson who helps and supports you is key to the brand,” he acknowledges. And, at the same time, the company works on its online channel. In fact, Casal affirms that currently the two systems coexist perfectly, and that she does not separate digital and physical sales, “they are integrated.”
Be careful with the margin
At Roberto Verino, prices have not risen as much as production and marketing costs, says its executive director. “In addition, we have incorporated products with more qualitative value into the collections and comparison is very difficult. Our client is very loyal, he is used to wearing Verino and views the purchase as an investment,” he highlights. “I can’t raise the prices, but I do understand that if I give you a 100% cashmere sweater it has to have a different price than before, when it was not 100% cashmere.”
Prices or, rather, their impact on commercial margins is one of the issues that most worries Casal with a view to 2025. It will be a year marked by geopolitics, “which will affect the fashion sector no matter what. “On the supply chain side and on the sales side.” And the increase in prices is the other workhorse that “makes margins narrow and the end customer is not so willing to accept a difference in prices because there is a variation in costs. Here we have homework to do in the sector. We have to be more efficient in the implementation of products, in distribution, in purchasing…”, he maintains.
Roberto Verino has a staff of 409 employees, which has increased by 6% in the last fiscal year and continues to do so this year. Above all, it is hiring for the areas of technology, product development, big data… because “we have always been a brand that has integrated trends into its own life style and with that has created its own style that is now called silent luxury.” , an aesthetic very typical of Verino, which gives a lot of play.” And it is very fashionable, like Galician design.
