Jakob Vahl-Zeuthen: “Better collaboration will lead to a more healthy and business-oriented industry”

Meet Jakob Vahl-Zeuthen, our International Sales Manager, who recently was featured on the podcast WEAR, published by the leading Danish industry association for trade in clothing, footwear, textiles, accessories, and lifestyle products. After an extensive career in the fashion and retail industry, Jakob joined Impulso at the end of 2022, and is now working the globe to onboard new fashion brands to our platform.

Tell us about your background.

“I have been working for more than 20 years in the fashion industry, as an agent, distributor, and retail owner. The last ten years primarily with Italian specialists, and market leaders.”

What drew you to work with Impulso?

“When a group of smart, experienced people, invented this solution, that clearly solves various issues within the fashion industry I was immediately hooked. At the same time, being able to help optimise the industry and do something good for mother earth drew me further towards Impulso.”

How has the industry changed during your time?

“In my early days in the fashion industry, brands offered 2-2.5x margins and were primarily producing. Today the demands from retailers have put pressure on brands to increase margins, knowing that the sell-through is not following the increased orders from the suppliers. The seasons have become shorter with more overstock to follow.”

What are the biggest challenges for brands you see right now?

“Brands and retailers are not frequently communicating and sharing useful knowledge. Very often we see retailers acting out of soft values and gut feelings instead of hard data. If there were a better collaboration between the parties and we would get a more healthy and business-oriented industry.“

What needs to happen?

“The use of data that both parties have could be a really efficient way to increase earnings and create a win-win situation for involved suppliers and retailers. In that way, we could also avoid a huge part of the overproduction within the industry.”

Listen to the interview with Jakob Vahl-Zeuthen here (In Danish).