Deckers Outdoor Corporation was incorporated in 1975 under the laws of the
State of California and, in 1993, reincorporated under the laws of the State
of Delaware. We are a global leader in designing, marketing and distributing
innovative footwear, apparel and accessories developed for both everyday casual
lifestyle use and high performance activities. We believe that our footwear
is distinctive and appeals broadly to women, men and children. We sell our products,
including accessories such as handbags and loungewear, through quality domestic
and international retailers, international distributors, and directly to end-user
consumers both domestically and internationally, through our websites, call
centers, and retail stores. Our primary objective is to build our footwear lines
into global lifestyle brands with market leadership positions. We seek to differentiate
our brands and products by offering diverse lines that emphasize authenticity,
functionality, quality, and comfort, and products tailored to a variety of activities,
seasons, and demographic groups. All of our products are currently manufactured
by independent contractors primarily in Asia. Our continued growth will depend
upon the broadening of our products offered under each brand, the appeal of
our products to our consumers, expanding domestic and international distribution,
successfully opening new retail stores, increasing sales to consumers, and developing
or acquiring new brands.
The design and product development team for each of our brands creates new
innovative footwear products that combine our standards of aesthetic leadership,
high quality, comfort, and functionality. The design function for all of our
brands is performed by a combination of our internal design and development
staff and outside freelance designers. By utilizing outside designers, we believe
we are able to review a variety of different design perspectives on a cost-efficient
basis and anticipate color and style trends more quickly.
For the past several years, we have been planning and preparing to improve,
automate and streamline our operational systems, processes, infrastructure and
management (Business Transformation Project or BT). One such initiative was
to upgrade our enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Our ERP system integrates
finance and accounting, purchase order management, inventory control, and sales
across all lines of business. The ERP system centralizes all of our transactional
data. We anticipate that the result is to increase efficiencies within the entire
company.
In order to ensure quality, consistency, and efficiency in our design and product
development process, we continually evaluate the availability and cost of raw
materials, the capabilities and capacity of our independent contract manufacturers,
and the target retail price of new models and lines. The design and development
staff works closely with brand management to develop new styles of footwear
and accessories for our various product lines. We develop detailed drawings
and prototypes of our new products to aid in conceptualization and to ensure
our contemplated new products meet the standards for innovation and performance
that our consumers demand. Throughout the development process, we have multiple
design and development reviews, which we then coordinate with our independent
manufacturers. This helps to ensure that we are addressing the needs of our
consumers and are working toward a common goal of developing and producing a
high quality product to be delivered on a timely basis.
Currently, our sales force is generally separated by brand, as each brand
generally has certain specialty consumers; however, there is overlap between
the sales teams and customers. We have aligned our brands sales forces to position
them for the future of the brands. Each brands respective sales manager recruits
and manages his or her network of sales representatives. We believe this approach
for the US market currently maximizes our selling efforts, while we continue
to explore synergies in our sales force operations to reflect the constantly
evolving retail marketplace.
We distribute products sold in the US through our distribution centers in Camarillo
and Moreno Valley, California. Our distribution centers feature a warehouse
management system that enables us to efficiently pick and pack products for
direct shipment to customers. For certain customers requiring special handling,
each shipment is pre-labeled and packed to the retailers specifications, enabling
the retailer to easily unpack our product and immediately display it on the
sales floor.