The “Canada Goose Phenomenon”

This Spring break, when I was in Fairbanks, Alaska for northern lights, I was surprised that more than half of the Chinese travelers there were wearing the same kind of jackets—the parka jacket with fluffy fur hood and a striking circular patch on the left arm. Right, those were Canada Goose parkas. My experience there literally looked like this (caution: profanity in video):

The Canadian brand suddenly became a superstar in the fashion world in recent years. Since 2013, many business media have talked about the company’s outstanding sale performance: Over the past decade, the privately-held Canada Goose has posted a growth rate of more than 4,000 percent, increasing its annual revenue from $5 million to nearly $300 million. The craziest part of this phenomenon are that these jackets are not something you could get at $200, their classic parkas sell from $595-$885.

The jacket was first designed and manufactured for people who work in frigid conditions that required high quality and warmth retention. For example, each United States Antarctic Program (USAP) staff was equipped with a red Canada Goose parka as working gear. Well, the comment they gave on the jacket was “it doesn’t seem fashion”. Right, the jacket was once perceived had nothing to do with fashion, and was purchased by USAP mainly because it was the warmest jacket could found in the market.

However it is the technical capacity of keeping physically warm that naturally introduced the jackets to tastemakers and stars. The trend started after celebrities were spotted wearing these coats on shoots, in movies and on the streets.

Looking at this phenomenon from a marketer’s point of view, there are really a few concepts at play here:

Cultural branding
Canada Goose doesn’t do a lot of marketing, instead they are doing cultural branding. Cultural branding could be understood as placing the products into the target audience and let the brand naturally become part of the culture.

“It comes down to having an amazing product that exceeds people’s expectations, creative and authentic marketing, and staying true to who we are, always,” said Dani Reiss, the current CEO of Canada Goose. “Because of that, we’ve been part of key moments in pop culture, which of course helps visibility, but on their own wouldn’t have been enough to fuel our continued global success.”

The “intended use” strategy

It is reasonable that the cold wave helped boost the sales of CG jackets, but what explains so many Chinese students in California were snapping up the jackets for a five-day long vacation to Alaska. The reason is simple, they want to keep warm in that bulky yet chic jacket. Cold is a physical sensation, but fear of cold is a psychological suggestion. You never know when it’s getting cold. Canada Goose is just taking advantage of that.

“Our job is to keep free people from the cold, right?” Spencer Orr, VP of design & merchandising at Canada Goose, says. “There’s no fixed standard of temperature. As long as I could tell customers what specific product they should wear under that specific weather condition, it’s always easy to sell out.” In other words, Canada Goose is more like selling an “intended use” rather than a down jacket.

This is kind of like the marketing positioning of Volvo. Everybody wants the best in front of the unexpected. Who doesn’t want the safest car in a potential accident? And who doesn’t want the warmest parka on a freezing cold day?

What do you think made the brand’s huge success?
Last, let’s enjoy Canada Goose’s first global campaign launched last year:

References:

http://www.bu.edu/today/2015/the-success-behind-canada-goose/

http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/why-so-many-people-are-suddenly-wearing-500-canada-goose-coats-163192

http://adage.com/article/cmo-strategy/canada-goose-debuts-global-campaign/301292/