Founded in 1913 by the accomplished outfitters Ralph Hawes and George Frederick Curtis,
Hawes & Curtis is a well-known Jermyn Street shirt-maker. The brand has been acclaimed by aristocracy and Hollywood elites alike with notable fans including Cary Grant, Frank Sinatra, Fred Astaire and Lord Mountbatten. In addition to building an iconic British brand, Hawes & Curtis has succeed in establishing a global presence and international customer base. Head of e-Commerce Antony Comyns joined in 2007 with the brief to build Hawes & Curtis’ online business and, today, the shirt-makers has twenty five UK stores, an overseas store in Germany and a franchise in the Middle East. We caught up with Antony to find out how Hawes & Curtis has fashioned a successful international business.
PayPal (PP): What have been your greatest successes?
Antony Comyns (AC): The introduction of our website has been extremely successful and has enabled us to offer entire collections to a global audience, expanding our reach well beyond Jermyn Street. We launched in 2007 with the initial aim of taking a million pounds online. We achieved this in our first year, and we have experienced steady growth since. Today 25 per cent of our business is conducted online, and 45 per cent of our sales are to international customers. Hawes and Curtis now sells to over 50 different countries, and this is largely down to the success of the e-Commerce site.
PP: When and how did you start selling abroad?
AC: We began by exploring which markets offered us the best sales opportunities and whether goods could be shipped to those locations quickly, safely and securely. Once these were identified, we researched different customers’ online shopping requirements and preferences, whilst establishing how best to use local post systems, courier services and different address formats.
PP: What is the greatest challenge you faced in building up an international customer base and how did you overcome it?
AC: Understanding local customs, requirements and preferences was tricky, but vitally important. They varied hugely by market, and differed greatly from our UK customers’ shopping habits. For example, certain countries were more comfortable using an English language site than others. To overcome this, we have developed dedicated websites for some of our biggest markets – so far Germany and Australia have their own websites with prices listed in their local currencies, and we’re currently looking at building one for the US.
PP: When did you start using PayPal?
AC: We started offering PayPal as a payment method in 2011. We wanted a payment option that was truly global and – as a trusted brand, used by upmarket sites all over the world – PayPal very much fit the bill. We’ve found that PayPal is also synonymous with online security. The name Hawes & Curtis may mean very little to someone sitting in the middle of America, but they will recognise and trust PayPal, which will give them the assurance they need to complete the purchase.
PP: Has using PayPal helped you build an international business?
AC: Having one payment service provider that covers a lot of countries, as well as being easy to integrate across all devices, has been key for our international expansion. Not only has PayPal allowed us to get to market very quickly, it has provided ease of use – and peace of mind – for our international customers. Shoppers abroad can pay in their local currency, and, through our partnership with PayPal, they feel confident they can make a secure payment.