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| Ivan Saldajeno |
By Ivan Saldajeno
MANDALUYONG--New Era, the world-famous cap brand, just landed in the Philippines.
On Tuesday, New Era launched its first Philippine store inside SM Megamall.
The official cap outfitter of the MLB and the NFL opened the said store with a bang as celebrities, baseball enthusiasts, and even the cap collectors flocked in to check out all of its caps, especially the best-selling 59Fifty line, and additional apparel lines.
Authentic Caps president Jonathan Lau revealed to Dugout Philippines how New Era Philippines came to life.
Lau narrated, "It all started with my partner Lloyd [Lim, Authentic Caps chairman]. He was wondering, 'What can we bring to the Philippines that [the Filipinos] haven't seen before. We just kept following that line, and eventually we ended up at New Era Hong Kong. We talked to Daniel Broderick, the head of the international business development. From there, we just got to talking, and we found out that we have a lot of things in common. And it just blew from there. It was an easy relationship actually."
About choosing SM Megamall as the site of New Era's flagship Philippine branch, Lau revealed, "I think they were as curious as we were to see how we do this sort of a setting, so they gave us this opportunity to showcase New Era."
Despite the store being located outside the Mega Fashion Hall, Lau expressed confidence that the store, which is located beside the supermarket, will perform well like the stores inside the said Building B area.
"The store may be just slightly outside the Mega Fashion Hall, but I think that's good because we don't want to be so exclusive. We are right where people want to be, right where people are," he continued.
He later revealed that New Era Philippines will have a second store in a couple of months.
"We have another branch. It's under development. It's in Trinoma, and it will be opening in mid-September," he bared.
About the future expansion plans, Lau uttered, "We're gonna wait and see. It's probably gonna take a month or two to get a feel for whether or not people will enjoy the brand. Tonight it looks like they do, but tomorrow is the real test, so we'll see."
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