People Bought Crocs During the Pandemic. They Haven’t Stopped.
While other brands that thrived with customers in quarantine have dropped off, sales of the easily slipped-on clogs are up nearly 200 percent since 2019.
Like Peloton, Etsy and Zoom, Crocs saw its business boom during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. The company’s aesthetically questionable but easily slipped-on clogs were the perfect footwear for Americans puttering around their homes, gardens and kitchens during quarantine.
But while many people got off their exercise bikes, cut back on D.I.Y. arts projects and resumed in-person meetings as a sense of normalcy returned to the world, they have kept their Crocs on.
Maggwa Ndugga of Raleigh, N.C., bought his first pair in 2020 and now has five. And he is spreading his enthusiasm, giving his parents and sisters each a pair for Christmas.
“They’re not the most appealing things to look at,” Mr. Ndugga, 25, said, but they offer support to his flat feet and can be worn whether he’s working at his standing desk at home, running errands, hiking on the weekends or lifting weights.
“I roll into the gym with my Crocs on and everything, and people ask, ‘Aren’t you going to change shoes?’” Mr. Ndugga said. “No, this is how I’m going to live life for now.”
Fans like Mr. Ndugga — along with celebrities like Questlove, who has been known to sport the clogs at award shows — have helped Crocs emerge as a rarity in the business world. It is a pandemic winner whose success might outlast pandemic shopping behavior.
The stock prices and sales of Peloton, Etsy and Zoom have dropped since their sharp rises in the pandemic, but Crocs’ stock has soared 167 percent since January 2020. The company’s annual sales have increased 200 percent since 2019.
At a recent conference in New York held by the wealth manager UBS, Andrew Rees, the chief executive of Crocs, said he often heard from the investment community that “Crocs was a pandemic beneficiary and it’s going to return to its norm.”
“There is very little chance of that happening, quite honestly,” Mr. Rees told a room of investors and analysts.
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Last month, after announcing that quarterly sales rose 61 percent, Crocs said it anticipated another record year of growth. Its management team laid out an ambitious business plan that promised more robust profits and revenues when many in the retail industry are trying to temper investor expectations. (Part of the surge in overall sales is coming from the company’s acquisition of the footwear brand Hey Dude.)
Crocs said in November that it expected revenue from its namesake shoe line to reach more than $5 billion in three years, a nearly 90 percent increase. It sees its adjusted operating margin staying around 26 percent even as other consumer companies are feeling a squeeze in their profits.
Of course, the company, which is based in Broomfield, Colo., might not reach these goals. Fashion is notoriously fickle, and footwear is a category that relies on the popular apparel of the moment, such as the latest jean cut.
But the reason for the optimism, company executives and analysts say, is a steady stream of new products and shrewd marketing, especially on social media, where Crocs has cultivated a devoted customer base. It has 165,000 followers on Twitter and even more on TikTok (920,600), Instagram (1.6 million) and Facebook (6.9 million).
Over the years, the brand has developed a distinctive online voice through its use of emojis and memes, making shoppers feel that its aim is creating a community rather than just getting people to buy more clogs.
The company is adept at seizing cultural moments, as it did when it tweeted about Questlove wearing black Crocs on the Oscars’ champagne-colored carpet this month. And during the pandemic, it drove customers to its mobile app with the promise of discounts, which it called Appy Hours.
“It’s not like people haven’t heard of using social media to create brand awareness and brand relevance, but this management team is just doing it better,” Jay Sole, a retail analyst at UBS, said.
Crocs has steadily become more popular among Generation Z shoppers, a coveted demographic for any retail brand. In the fall, teenagers ranked Crocs No. 5 on a list of footwear brands, according to a biannual Piper Sandler survey. In 2017, it was No. 38. Hey Dude also cracked the top 10 in the most recent survey.
The more obsessive customers collect Crocs, which often sell for $49.99; it’s not uncommon for someone to have a dozen pairs or more. They can be accessorized with Jibbitz, the personalized trinkets pushed into the holes of Crocs clogs.
“My Crocs are part of my self-care,” said Ms. Alleyne, 33, of Roanoke, Va. “I’m not going to give up my therapy because the economy is going to crap. You go in for the shoe, but you stay for the community.”
Her 8-year-old son is now hooked, too. He owns 20 pairs and recently received a pair from his father, who lives in Kuwait. (Ms. Alleyne and her son have a long way to go before catching up to Doogie Lish Sandtiger, whose 2,100 pairs of Crocs are reputed to be the most.)
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/27/busi ... sales.html
one day I'll have 60 pair
