K2 Sports Group Is a Global Success Story, Largely Due to Its Ability to Take a Very Complex Business with Multiple Brands and Apply a Clear and Simple Vision

EXECUTIVE INTERVIEW

The rise and rise of RICHARD BRANSON

DUBAI DUTY FREE’S COLM MCLOUGHLIN AQUAFIL’S GIULIO BONAZZI PTC SOFTWARE’S JAMES HEPPELMANN Rethinking MATADOR’S STEFAN ROSINA As featured in business: the K2 SPORT GROUP'S customer is wrong ROBERT MARCOVITCH

TALENT AND TENACITY The 2016 Global Female The CEO Magazine Leaders Summit hours in 48Singapore 'HELICOPTER MONEY' Think the For more info visit unthinkable Schaeffler Group’s Klaus Rosenfeld GROWTH theceomagazine.com MASTER Snow CHRYSLER’S 300 SRT8: AMERICAN MUSCLE AT ITS BEST • JAVA IS THE NEW BALI business K2 Sports Group is a global success story, largely due to its ability to take a very complex business with multiple brands and apply a clear and simple vision.

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ack in 1962, when brothers Bill and Don Kirschner founded their ski gear business, they could barely have imagined the global giant that K2 Sports would become. With 15 brands across multiple businesses, the group is a complex entity manufacturing, marketing, and selling a complete range of ski and snowboarding Bequipment and accessories. CEO Robert Marcovitch has a unique way of keeping it all in perspective.

“I like to tell people that we are actually making sandwiches,” he says. “And what I need to do, to make sure that you keep coming back to my business, is to make sure that every sandwich you get is exactly the same—not only the right amount of lettuce, but also make sure that the lettuce was grown by the same farmer, so you won’t turn around and say ‘well this isn’t as good as the last time.’ That’s why a good supply chain is so important.

“We have 10–12 key strategic suppliers with whom we cooperate significantly in almost every aspect of our collective businesses. We work very closely on product development, and commodity enhancement for materials, we work on the logistics side of things to improve our ability to get to market on time—with multiple brands, businesses, and commodities it’s really important to coordinate those activities as best we can for everybody involved. When you Name Robert Marcovitch want to get skis and poles and boots all out at the same time, it takes an Company K2 Sports Group Position CEO enormous amount of coordination and we are continually looking at ways to HQ Seattle, US improve not just our products, but our processes, too.

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“We have a very sophisticated short-list of suppliers because it’s very important to reduce or eliminate any product failures. The products that we sell are used in extreme conditions, where it’s often very cold. They’re used very rigorously, and safety is paramount— MATERIAL HANDLING we’re almost making precision medical Crown Plastics UHMW-PE in continuous rolls instruments in that respect. So we need and variable thicknesses enhances package flow and reduces energy consumption. to make sure that there is that level of sophistication on the part of our suppliers, and our manufacturers. We need to make sure there’s continuity, and we need to make sure there is continuous monitoring—not just by us of them, but also their own monitoring. It’s one of the main things that we’re concerned about because we’re dealing with active sports activities and we “At our core, we really believe have to do everything we can to ensure that what we do is put smiles on that we reduce any chance of failure.” people’s faces. How we do it is a TRANSPORTATION The DuraSurf™ line of UHMW products are whole different story, but at the an excellent solution when materials create This constant monitoring and noise or wear. improvement drives the company not end of the day that’s really what only to success, but also growth. What our jobs are.” – Robert Marcovitch Full page advert was once a very US-centric business Crown Plastics now has global reach, and Robert is very proud of the fact that K2 Sports with us, and to manufacture in the most FOR THE MOVERS Group now does more business outside cost-efficient fashion in a very technical AND SHAKERS the US than within. “We certainly pride environment. This is especially so ourselves in our process improvements, because we manufacture nine different what our jobs are and we do whatever Crown Plastics is the world’s leading and we continue to do so in every commodities, it’s not simply skis that we can to enable people to go out and manufacturer of thin gauge aspect of the business on an we make—it’s ski equipment. It’s Alpine enjoy the limited amount of UHMW polyethylene. Our unique international basis. We manage the skis, Nordic skis, as well as poles, and recreational time that’s available to COMPOSITES continuous compression molding process business with a relatively small boots, so it’s quite a complex enterprise people today in their busy, active lives. Our unique manufacturing advantage is our ability gives us tremendous flexibility executive infrastructure, and rely on in that regard with not only multiple That really is at the heart of our to create composite materials via long, continuous clear, open communication, making brands, but multiple commodities. Not business: we want to make sure that compression runs at high temperatures and pressures. in the marketplace in a variety of industries every effort to measure everything we to forget snowboards, snowboard boots when people go outside, they can do it including material handling, transportation, do. When we speak of improvement, and bindings, inline skates, snowshoes, in a worry-free fashion, they can feel composites, recreation and many other we look at every part of the business to and avalanche safety equipment. We try confident that the equipment is robust, hi-tech engineering applications. make it more efficient because: we are to take as much complexity out of all of and that it’s going to provide them with manufacturers; we put significant effort this without homogenising the different the level and ease of performance that into R&D; we are marketers; and, brands and businesses. Because we they truly require.” sellers. We distribute in almost 60 don’t believe in painting everything countries, so we must also have with the one brush, we’re not just operational expertise in finance. changing logos and lipstick.

“During Robert’s initial tenure as CEO of K2, we RECREATION “At the end of the day, we really want to “At our core, we really believe that what developed the best, truest partnership I have experienced in my nearly 40 years at Crown. His DuraSurf™ UHMW has been the favorite choice make it easier for our customers to we do is put smiles on people’s faces. attitude spread down through the entire organisation, of snowboard, ski and wakeboard manufacturers Crown Plastics Co., Inc., 116 May Drive, Harrison, Ohio 45030 U.S.A. work with us, and more engaging for How we do it is a whole different story, and enabled us to develop the mutually beneficial worldwide for running surface (base) material due Phone: 800-368-0238 • www.CrownPlastics.com relationship we have today.” - Gary R Ellerhorst, to its incredible abrasion and impact resistance. International Calling: 00-1-513-367-0238 consumers to establish relationships but at the end of the day that’s really President/CEO, Crown [email protected] • In Europe: [email protected]

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