SPEAKER_01 0:12

Hello, welcome back to another episode of the Men's Wear Style Podcast. I'm your host, Pete Brooker, and today on the show I'm speaking to Sebastian Earn. He is the founder of Mercvist. You might remember we had Sebastian on around about 2020, I want to say. So a while ago, and it's great to catch up with him. Mercfist, just a quick recap. The journey of Mercfist started in 2016. It started small, like most things do, but with a very precise idea to craft quality footwear in a timeless design and at a reasonable price. A product that could withstand both the test of time as well as the test of trends. The Scandinavian design, the attention to the finest of details, and the very best of materials from top tanneries in the world are at the very core of their business. Much thanks to this, they were rewarded as the fastest growing footwear brand of Sweden in 2020. Even though they still take pride in their Scandinavian heritage, their shoes are today worn on every continent across the globe, and far from only Swedes nerve the brand. And head over to Merkvis.com, do all your shopping and find out more about the brand over there. So we have uh Merckvis now on Germain Street. We're going to be talking about that. There's a new store opening up in Oslo. But to tell the story, a quick recap of the brand and where it's going, where it's heading now, is the founder of Merckvist, Sebastian Une. Welcome back, Sebastian Orn, who is the founder of Mercfest. How are we doing today, Sebastian? Doing very well, thank you. Good to see you, Peter. Good to see you, my friend. Well, it's been a minute. I'm trying to think when we had you on the show last. It's got to be about three or four years ago. Longer.

SPEAKER_02 1:55

I actually looked I yesterday, I looked at the uh I I went back like and list on the podcast, and I think it was more like published May 2020.

SPEAKER_01 2:07

And are we at peak COVID during that time? I get COVID brain, so I never know the start and the end of it, but it sounds like it's right in the middle of it.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

COVID, probably thought it was gonna get over within a couple of weeks at the time. So yeah, it was a different back then.

SPEAKER_01 2:32

How deluded we were. Well, listen, Sebastian, for the uh for the sake of the listeners, perhaps can you just remind us uh of the brand of where you've come from and where you are now, please?

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Yes. So uh Merkvist is or however you want to pronounce it, uh, I know it's gonna be a difficult one for the for the non-Swedish speakers. So we we tend to use the Y as a vowel here. So Merkvist is perfectly fine. Um anyway, so Merkvist is an I would call it a next generation footwear brand focusing on on timeless, initially Goodyear world addresses, but uh more recently expanded into new new types of products such as sneakers and what we like to call semi-casuals. So something that looks somewhat formal, but has has the comfort and you know, perhaps um more of a sneaky-looking soul. Um and and uh really the the core offering of MOOCus is being price value, so offering as much quality uh and value that we can at an uh accessible price point, right?

SPEAKER_01 3:52

Okay, okay, that's that brings it all back. And yeah, just going on the website as well. The trainers look great. Perhaps you can talk about how you did that directionally, going from the shoe to the trainer. Is there is there things that you can pull upon? Do you have different factories that have to do both? Do you need a new design team?

SPEAKER_02 4:10

Of course. I think I mean really uh I I didn't re-listen on our previous uh episode, but it was quite a necessity during COVID. Uh at the time 2020 uh 2020, the the global market for dress shoes went down 84% compared to 2019.

unknown 4:34

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 4:35

So that so we were focused on that category. Yeah, we almost had no sneakers at the time, um or casual shoes, and basically we sold our product to uh men who were going to the office or going to a wedding or a special social occasion, and that practically became illegal across the world. Uh so it was a dramatic market pressure uh that actually forced us into to uh developing new styles that could be used more casually, that was more in time with with uh people's new habits during 2020 and even up until 2022, perhaps even 2023. So um that that was kind of the reason why we went into go to more casual shoes, uh, but we still try to design them within the aesthetic of Mirkvis, being timeless, elegant, and Scandinavian minimalism. Um obviously, or not is not necessarily obviously, but uh uh typically factories that we work with specialize in different constructions and and sneakers and trainers being uh not goody weather construction, we'd like to find a factory that specializes in that. At the same time, we try to use the same types of leathers uh and suede so we have a consistency across different materials uh between our Goodyear weather shoes, the dress shoes, and the more casual styles.

SPEAKER_01 6:17

So, yeah, I mean it was almost like you had to rethink the company in terms of how it can survive and tread water through this time, yet not lose your identity as a company and take the signatures of design, what you had with the shoes, into the more casual wear. And when you say like Scandinavian design, apart from the minimalist factor, are there any other things that you can associate with Scandinavian designs, in particular with footwear?

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Well, I think I mean if you just look at it more generally or broadly speaking, um, I think Scandinavian design is perhaps defined by um a neutral colour palette, um clean lines, and I think we apply that quite well to um to the footwear. So if you contrast our shoes and the design, like if you just gonna speak it generally about our we have many different styles, but in general the Mercvis design is and if you contrast that to like the British, we might be less a bit less chunky and rounded. If you compare contrast it to like Italian styles uh or other certain European brands uh that tend to be like lighter and pointier, we're somewhere in between those, I would say. And we're also a bit less colourful and focusing more on materials, clean lines, uh, and yeah, high quality materials. Yeah, interesting. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_01 7:54

No, it does. Yeah, no, it makes perfect sense. And look, it's it's something I've spoken about ad nauseum on this podcast, but I don't know why more people aren't into this aesthetic when it comes to footwear. And I'll tell you why, from my point of view, I get to travel a lot. I'm quite lucky, but I don't want to pack a whole load of shoes and trainers in my luggage. So I I generally go for a very smart pair of trainers that doesn't look like it is out there trainers with logos on it, and not built for afflasia and things like that. At the same time, it could just slide over into something that I could go out for dinner in, or you know, I could be seen in something quite presentable. So just a very minimalist black trainer almost is something that I would I would probably steer towards because I can just get more versatility out of that and wear it into you know different places, different events, and different occasions. It's just it seems nuts that people don't go down that path as well. But I don't know, is that something that that you find as well with your customers? That's something that they steer towards.

SPEAKER_02 8:50

I think yeah, I mean we introduced quite a lot of trainers or or sneakers uh with what we call um like a matching colour of the sole to the upper. So, for example, I know we're recording this on audio only, but I'm showing you here in the camera just for you to get an idea. You see, this is a black suede, yeah, uh trainer or sneaker with a black sole. So typically you find most trainers and sneakers have a white contrasting sole, and I don't think that necessarily looks very good with uh with your suit trousers, right? Yeah, yeah. So if you have like a navy suit uh or or suit trousers or chinos or or or even any type of more like dressed trousers, uh I think it looks quite odd to have a thick contrasting white soul, it looks a bit too sporty. So if you want to put off the um the trainer and suit look, I think definitely you have to go for something like we do, monochrome. And I think that's been received quite well by our audience and become very popular.

SPEAKER_01 10:07

Sebastian, I think the last time we spoke, you had you hadn't put your foot into London yet. You have a store now in Germain Street, is that right? Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 10:16

So we open up our first shop outside of Sweden in August 2024, so uh on exactly on German Street at the very beginning of it near Piccadilly Circus.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

And how's that working out for you?

SPEAKER_02 10:31

Um it's just been seven months now, so um it's it's a bit difficult to really compare and and and know what to compare your numbers with, but so far we're quite happy. Um it is um it's it's definitely a high rent and we we paid in Stockholm. So I mean we we've seen a nice development. I also think it adds a lot to to the global brand perception.

SPEAKER_01 11:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:01

And German Street is really it's really nice to be there right in next to 20 other peer brands or competition, if you like.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

And how did that opportunity come about? Were you looking for places in London to set up shop and this came on the market, or were you approached?

SPEAKER_02 11:20

So Meekvis has been around for almost eight years now, and we opened up a Stockholm store relatively early uh in the company's like life. COVID was obviously a hiccup in our growth plan, but we had our eyes on we've had our eyes on London for quite a while and wanted a physical representation there uh to connect with our customer and and I think it it took a certain amount of recovering from the COVID years uh for us to build up not just the financial means but also the confidence, and so it took a bit longer than planned, but we we had been thinking about it for quite a while.

SPEAKER_01 12:04

Do you come to London much yourself? What's the day-to-day runnings of the business like for you now?

SPEAKER_02 12:10

Unfortunately, uh I haven't been back that much. I visited in in actually a couple of weeks ago, but that was the first time since we did an opening. And um, our store manager Kit, who's running the shop over there, he's doing a tremendous work. So he has given me no reason to come and babysit, which uh it's quite sad because I do like London. I uh I'd like to have an excuse to come there more often, but in general, I'm traveling quite a lot, so I'm trying to cut down on just traveling days. Uh and yeah, it's all about prioritizing.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

Yeah. Oh, that's a good sign for kit. Yeah, it's always a good sign when the manager doesn't have to come down and crack the whip. Exactly. It's been great catching up with you, and uh the website looks like it's also come on leaps and bounds as well. So, you know, it's it's really nice to navigate around. The imagery is really strong. Are you what are the what are the next plans in store for you for 2025, especially, would you say, with the brand?

SPEAKER_02 13:10

So the big news, and we we announced this just a one or two weeks ago, is that we're opening up a third store. It's gonna be in Oslo, Norway. Nice. Uh, so that's gonna come to life late this spring, so just in a few months. Uh, we're still working out the the contractors and everything to do the shop fit. So uh it's a bit difficult to say exactly like the opening date now, but uh obviously we have an ambition to open up as soon as possible. Uh but we have uh we have a place, we sign everything, and uh so that's gonna be a big step for us opening up a third retail space. Um and then obviously we we are adding on a few more stars for the spring. Um we've invested a lot in developing our own proprietary components and materials, and it's nice to finally see them rolled into production. So uh for you to get a better idea of what I mean with that is that uh previously in the beginning of the of the brand's journey, we uh uh tended to use uh, for example, soles that were open to any um brand to use. Lately we have been uh investing in uh um sorry, I'm losing the word here in English. Uh like in the molds, that's what it's called, to make the for example the rubber soles. So um if I show you here in the camera, you can see this is our own like design that we own and only we can use it.

SPEAKER_01 14:53

Um yeah, that looks fantastic, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:56

And that allows you to, for example, when it comes to a casual cemented shoe, like this one I'm holding in, or a trainer for that matter, uh the shape of the foot is defined by the last, and the shape of the last is defined by the soul. So if you if you don't design your own propriety components, you cannot really make the design exactly how you want it. You have then you are restricted by what's open in the market for components, and it takes quite a long time and money to invest in in design of proprietary components, mostly the souls. So it's finally now that we're seeing more and more shoes uh rolling out from production with these one song, and it's gonna be a significant step up in the overall feeling of design and quality.

SPEAKER_01 15:52

I mean, that's a lot on your plate. You've got a new shop, you've got new designs. I mean, I've I've done shop fits before, I've run retail outlets as well, so I know like how big a deal it is to get some new bricks and mortar up and down so many moving parts. Yeah. Do you have like the same design ethic for the shops so that it kind of ties in with the brand? So people know when they walk in a shop it's work fist, or do you have to just go right? Everything's different, a bit like I guess ASOP, you know, they just kind of oh yeah, they make a shop.

SPEAKER_02 16:23

Yeah, ASOP is a very ASOP has done the retail uh quite well, I think. Um for us, we we're not that we we tried we're trying to build um a store design that it's more consistent across our shops. However, uh the London shop um uh is gonna look it's gonna be influential on the Oslo shop, whereas the Stockholm shop we was our first one, and um it's it's restricted about what interior we have there, and we're actually currently re uh looking at redoing uh revamping the Stockholm shop as well. So they're gonna be like some significant elements of how we design our shops. For example, we we use uh a shelving system as part of the uh surface design of the walls, where we also you that we also has a practical use of of uh fitting our inventory. So running a shoe shop, let's say we have 120 different styles, each style comes in like 10 different sizes. I'm just throwing out some round numbers here, but roughly that's where we're at. We're close to 15,000 uh 1500 individual uh articles, so that's a lot of stock, and some styles you want more than one in just each size, right? Yeah, so we we figure out a design of our shelving system where we actually put our boxes onto the wall and they become like a nice square pattern of uh of the walls.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Nice, okay. Yeah, so that it all ties together. I think the the main trouble that I have, and I don't know if you've thought about this as well, is that you need to have you need to have the journey of people experiencing the brand in store and then not having that confused with when they go online, as in it all needs to tie together so it doesn't one doesn't look like one and the other doesn't look like the other. It looks like there could be things that tie in so people have a a footprint almost when they walk in the shop, and then if they were to go online later or at any other time, it doesn't feel like such a jarring experience to go away from the online experience to the the in-store experience. Have you have you thought about that? And is there ways that you've kind of crossed paths with those or cross-pollinated the two?

SPEAKER_02 18:48

Yes, I think um it ties into all the different touch points of the brand, not just uh the website or the store, it's everything to do with the boxes and the bags and the packaging and and the and the Instagram for that matter. And I think in a in 2024, we've done a tremendous job of in making our brand book more concise and applying it across all the different touch points. So um if you go into a London store, for example, you will see our accenture colour of orange, like we we have a typical colour code of orange that we use, uh, and it's it's just like you'll see it on the on the corner niche in the ceiling and maybe on some of the display modules, and then you also see it repeating on our, for example, show you the sign of our shoe box here. Um have we have the same orange in the corner on the shoe box, like accents going around the box, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:53

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so we have this taupe uh box.

SPEAKER_02 19:57

So I think I mean it's not just colours, but colors is a quite easy way to explain it that we're trying to to more uh rigorously apply our brand components onto all the different touch points, and that takes takes a lot of time, but I think uh together with with the components that I I told you before, we're rolling it out slowly, and it's coming to quite together quite nicely now.

SPEAKER_01 20:25

Okay, Sebastian, listen, I've I've been fascinated listening and catching up as well with the brand. I can't wait to get back down to Jermaine Street and uh and see and shop. But I want to ask before we before we call time on this, has anyone ever confused you with Henry Cavill from Mission Impossible Rogue Nation, especially with the moustache?

SPEAKER_02 20:46

You know that you know the one I mean the Walker, I think he was called in the in the um I've heard Henry Cavill before, but not that specific character.

SPEAKER_01 20:55

All right, I'm gonna send you an image from the film. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's not a bad thing.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

I mean, to be uh is uh is it true that he's gonna be the next James Bond?

SPEAKER_01 21:06

So uh well, we don't know, but what was interesting in the last couple of weeks they released audition tapes. I don't know if you saw those on YouTube. If you type in Henry Cavill James Bond audition, he auditioned about 20 years ago for the role, and it came down to two. It was either him or um well, Daniel Craig, and apparently it got to the wire, and obviously Daniel Craig got the gig. But I mean he was really young when he did these auditions, so he's still in the running.

SPEAKER_02 21:33

Yeah, I was gonna say 20 years ago.

SPEAKER_01 21:35

Yeah, yeah. I mean, so Casino Royale came out 2006, so these audition tapes are about 2005, so you but he's still in the running. Uh, how old is he? Is he I think he's about 40, I want to say 43, maybe he's it's early 40s. Um I mean, like Roger Moore was like 44 when mid-50s. Oh, yeah, Daniel Craig is about 52 now or 53. But yeah, he's he's definitely out of the game now, Daniel Craig. So it's it's up for grabs. So maybe you want to hand in your resume, you know. Ion have got their headquarters down Piccadilly, it's just over the road from you down there at Jermaine Street. Exactly. Tell you what, you're too modest, Sebastian. I'll send it in on your behalf. Next time I'm passing, I'll just drop a photo of you through the letterbox of Ian Productions and and uh with your contact details. But listen, it's been it's been great catching up. Mercvis.com, the place to go. We'll put all the links in the show notes. And I, you know, even if you're not in London or you're not in Sweden and you can't you don't have the opportunity to drop in the shop. I do recommend just going online and having a look at these beautiful statement footwares. And in the meantime, next time you're in London, please give me a shout, Sebastian. We'll go off a coffee. We'll do it, Peter.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

All right, it was great talking to you.

SPEAKER_00 22:54

And you take care.co.uk for more menswear content and email info at menswearstyle.co.uk if you would like to be a future guest on the show. Finally, please help support the show by leaving a review on iTunes or wherever you're listening to this podcast. Until next time.