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Interview with Don Rongione

Don Rongione
Don Rongione
President & CEO
Bollman Hat Company
Bollman Hat Company

Hat & caps claim 7 per cent of global fashion accessories market
Founded in 1868 in Adamstown, Pennsylvania, Bollman Hat Company designs, manufactures, and distributes headwear and accessories for men, women and children. It offers wool felt, fur felt, straw hats and caps. The company supplies private label headwear to brands and retailers covering fashion, outdoor apparel, uniform, formal wear, and sports markets. President and CEO Don Rongine opens up about the global hat market and more in a chat with Fibre2Fashion.

Which hats at Bollman are popular in the domestic and international markets?

In our Kangol brand, we are seeing strong trends coming from our berets and bucket shapes, known as 'the casual'. While these silhouettes are also strong in our Helen Kaminski brand, Helen Kaminski has a strong presentation and interest in wide brim fedoras and gaucho crown styles. Our bailey brand is dominated by fedora shapes as well as ivy and pub cap styles that are popular today. Which hats at Bollman are popular in the domestic and international markets?
 

After 150 years in the hat making business, what has changed and what has stayed at Bollman?

When Bollman started making hats, automobiles were not yet invented. Our hats were taken by horse and cart to the railroad station to get to our customers' stores. We started making hats before electricity was used in manufacturing so our factory was powered by water. Today, we are a global company with 10 leading brands, and while we still produce about 35 per cent of what we sell in our factory in Adamstown, we source finished product and raw materials from around the world.  What remains the same is a caring culture. This means caring for our customers, co-workers, quality, suppliers and environment.

What is the size of the global market for the hat? What is the average growth rate?

The global market for hats is approximately 13 billion with an estimated average growth of 3 per cent.

How many collections do you come up with each year for all your brands? Are the collections the same for the United States and abroad?

We release two collections per year for most of our brands: spring/summer and autumn/winter. These collections are released globally with some 'special make-ups' added for certain markets.

Which are your best selling and signature products? Which points of sales are working well for you in the domestic and international markets?

Our Kangol brand's signature products are the casual, berets and the 504 shape which is a flat cap. Pullons and baseball caps are also strong sellers for Kangol.

For our Helen Kaminski brand, the crocheted raffia and braided raffia styles in brimmed fedoras and open crowns are the strongest styles. 

Our Bailey wool felt, fur felt and straw fedoras and ivy caps styles are the signature styles. 

We continue to see growth online at hats.com, baileyhats.com, kangolstore.com, and 
helenkaminski.com along with approved online retailers. 

What percentage do hats claim in the global fashion accessories market?

Hat and caps claim approximately 7 per cent in the global fashion accessories market.

Which are the major markets for Bollman hats? Which new markets do you see potential in?

All of our brands are represented in North America and Europe. Our major brands, Helen Kaminski, Kangol and Bailey are sold throughout the world. Our leading markets are the United States, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia, France and Spain. Markets with greater potential would include India, China, Chile, Brazil and Singapore. Which are the major markets for Bollman hats? Which new markets do you see potential in?

What is the number of pieces manufactured annually?

We manufacture roughly about 500,000 units per year at our US factory with an expectation of growth for this year and next.

What has been your growth story?

Our revenue is up 12 per cent over last the year and we anticipate continued growth.

Which are your major points of sale?

Our brands appear in leading department stores and fashion boutiques like David Jones in Australia, Galeria Kaufhof in Germany, Harrods in England and Le Bon Marché in France, as well as in leading hat stores and online retailers, including our own www.hats.com.

In the United States, some of our brands are found in Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdale's, Saks 5th Avenue, Macy's, Dillard's, and Lord and Taylor.

Which headwear style is most sought after?

Baseball caps continue to be the most sought-after casual style in most of our markets for men, but from the fashion world, the fedoras style would be the most sought-after style.

How do you dispose off textile and raw material waste?

We have been working on recycling and upcycling our wool felt waste, including utilising the material for plant growth.

Where are your manufacturing units located? What is the production capacity?

Bollman owns America's oldest hat factory in Adamstown, where we are producing about 500,000 finished hats per year on one shift. This is only about 10 per cent of capacity production.  We also operate a wool scouring plant in Texas.  In addition, finished hats are produced in other countries, including Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Vietnam, China, England, Italy and Mexico.

What are the top three hat trends among men, women and children?

The top hat trends for women are currently fedoras, berets and bucket styles. The top hat trends for both men and children would be fedoras, flat caps and bucket styles. What are the top three hat trends among men, women and children?

Where do you source raw material from? What kinds of machines do you use for manufacturing?

Wool is a primary material for our manufacturing process. We use carding, felting, sanding, blocking and various sewing machines. We also use wool yarn and polyester blend yarn for our knitting operations. Woven straw hat bodies are brought in from Ecuador and Asia and blocked and sewn at the US factory. Fur felt bodies are procured from Europe.

What are the future plans at Bollman?

For the first time, Bollman Hat Company has created The Bollman Hat Company branded makers' collection. This collection consists of 12 men's and 12 women's hats and is named after 24 Bollman Hat employee-owners who each have 35 years or more of service.  The hats are sold exclusively at our website hats.com and our first ever store in Santa Monica, California.  Please visit our YouTube channel to see our newly released video celebrating our 150 years at www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlMbC_iaQT0&t=2s

We are working to expand our leading brands into more retail locations throughout the world and expand our top brands into other accessory categories. (HO)

Published on: 20/09/2018

DISCLAIMER: All views and opinions expressed in this column are solely of the interviewee, and they do not reflect in any way the opinion of Fibre2Fashion.com.