Azzurri tackles sports market

WATERFORD clothing company Azzurri is set to make a pitch for the GAA market and has dreams of seeing a team wearing its jerseys lift the Sam Maguire in Croke Park within a few years.

At present Azzurri manufactures protective clothing for fire-fighters which it exports around the world to places as far flung as Bahrain, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand.

The company recorded a turnover of in excess of 4 million last year. Protective clothing accounted for about 60% of this but sports gear for GAA, rugby, soccer and golf clubs now accounts for 30% of sales and is continuing to grow.

Husband and wife team John and Miriam Molloy set up the company in the late 1980s with the aim of getting into sports wear but it is only in the last few years that they have finally achieved this goal.

Both have extensive experience in the clothing industry John as an industrial engineer and Miriam as a qualified pattern maker. During the 1980s they worked in South Africa where John managed a company making rucksacks and played rugby with the Johannesburg Wanderers.

It was after the couple returned to Ireland that they set up Sewsuir a small company with a staff of three, manufacturing industrial wear clothing. Initially the company built up business in waterproof clothing and gradually established a niche market for protective wear for fire-fighters.

By 1998 the company was renamed Azzurri and moved its 26 employees into a 12,000 sq ft premises in the Kilcohan Industrial Park in Waterford. At this point it began producing leisure wear and tracksuits.

Renaming the company was a key decision. John chose Azzurri after watching Italia 90 World Cup it's the Italian for 'the blues' and is the name by which the Italian soccer team is known. It also just happens to be the Waterford colour. "It's a good name for a sports wear company it looked well, it spelt well and we felt it would make a good strong brand name," said John.

The aim of the company is to establish a strong brand identify for Azzurri to date the name has caused a little confusion because some people have thought it's a foreign company or have been puzzled why a company with an Italian name is making GAA jerseys. But John is confident that in the long run Azzurri is a name that will stick.

Breaking into the sports wear market in Ireland has not been easy John says it's taken a lot of time, effort and money.

"It took two years to get a GAA licence but since we've come on board the GAA has been very supportive," John said.

Nine months ago Azzurri secured a licence to supply GAA clubs around the country and three months ago it got the licence to supply county teams. The licence for the county teams came close to the end of the season but the company intends to actively market its team kits at the start of the new one.

Azzurri is already supplying some 60 GAA clubs around the country and has supplied leisure wear for county boards.

John's aim is to build up the company reputation gradually so that in a few years GAA teams all over the country will tog out in Azzurri gear.

The company, which now has a staff of 60, is proud to be the first in the country to offer clubs and sports organisations an online opportunity to clubs to design their team kit on the Azzurri website.

Currently the major share of sales are go direct to clubs and schools but Azzurri has plans to see its leisure wear and sports gear go on sale in the retail sector.

Long term the company also has plans to develop sales in the UK and is already selling to soccer and rugby clubs and schools in Northern Ireland and the UK.

On the domestic market the GAA is the company's main focus although the Azzurri is also planning to develop sales to rugby clubs and soccer clubs around the country. It's also launching a new range of golf wear later this month.

"I have two main ambitions for the company to see All-Ireland teams in Croke Park play in our kit and to see the Munster rugby team wear it playing in the European Cup," added John.