Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, June 4, 1990 TAG: 9006020114
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: STEVE GOLDBERG COX NEWS SERVICE
DATELINE: WINDER, GA. LENGTH: Medium
"They offered me a price and I bought it. I didn't know what I was going to do with it," said Baseheart, who was then vice president of O'Bryan Bros., a small manufacturer of overalls and denim work jackets in Nashville.
But the man they now call Duck came up with a plan. Using one of O'Bryan's patterns, he fashioned the fabric into work pants, slapped on a bright yellow label that incorporated his company's longtime logo - a mallard head - and convinced a store near the Ole Miss campus in Oxford to buy 12 pairs.
Three days later the slacks were sold out, and a new trend in Southern fashion known as Duck Head had been hatched.
Today, the ubiquitous Duck Head label is visible throughout the South, from college campuses to law offices to police department locker rooms. Sales of the brand have skyrocketed, from about $1 million in 1980 to more than $40 million last year, company officials say.
The pants' baggy style, heavy material and solid construction - along with their ability to go with T-shirts as well as a coat and tie - have made them a favorite of the active, under-35 set, clothiers say.
Baseheart bought O'Bryan Bros. in 1985 and sold it last year to Delta Woodside Industries, a Greenville, S.C., textile conglomerate, for an estimated at $14 million. Delta Woodside has been moving quickly to position its duck to fly even higher.
Last spring it formed a new division - Duck Head Apparel Co., with headquarters here - and earlier this month, Duck Head hired a Nashville advertising agency - the brand's first - to create a national campaign.
The company plans to spend more than $1 million for full-page ads in Playboy, Sports Illustrated and Rolling Stone, as well as limited spots on ESPN and MTV.
By this fall, Duck Head hopes to have its clothes in specialty and department stores from Manhattan to California for the first time, to coincide with the media blitz.
Meanwhile, designers have been expanding the Duck Head line to include new colors and styles - such as madras shirts and teal seersucker shorts.
The company also has started going after a national college market, setting up a booth on the Florida beach during spring break this year to give away beer mugs and autographed posters of "Lori," a green-eyed model clad only in a Duck Head T-shirt.
Duck Head President Danny Stanton said he expects the brand's sales to reach $150 million in three years.
Despite the anticipated growth, officials say they aren't afraid that moving away from the regional, word-of-mouth approach that's gotten the brand this far will kill the duck that laid the golden egg.
"The job of the ads is to increase awareness of the brand. It's not necessarily . . . a hard-hitting, go-buy-Duck Heads campaign," said Stanton. "The ads will be subtle. This is not the kind of brand you go hit somebody upside the head with.
Industry analysts say the national market is ready for Duck Heads. For proof, they point to the recent success of Levi's Dockers, another brand of baggy slacks that appeals to men growing tired of - and perhaps too large for - regular blue jeans.
Stanton acknowledged that the success of Dockers helped Duck Head decide to enter the national market. In fact, Baseheart said Levi's expressed interest in buying Duck Head before he sold it to Delta Woodside.
Part of Duck Head's strength, analysts say, is Delta Woodside's capability - through a recent series of acquisitions - to manufacture much of the brand itself. Such a move should increase the company's profit margins, said Patti Ryan, vice president and research analyst with Raymond, James & Associates of St. Petersburg, Fla.
Duck Head now has 10 plants in three states and Costa Rica, and is in the process of acquiring an additional plant in Costa Rica and five in Tennessee. The purchases will bring the division's work force to 4,200 employees.
by CNB