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Winnipeg Free Press
16-06-2025
- Business
- Winnipeg Free Press
Buy Canadian moment creates opportunity for Roots and its domestic leather business
TORONTO – Rifling through the Roots Corp. product archives on a recent Thursday morning, CEO Meghan Roach is surrounded by the kind of heritage 'most consumer brands would die to have.' In every direction she turns are racks of leather jackets spanning the company's 52 years. Some are replicas of custom pieces gifted to Toronto Raptors players for their 2019 championship win, the cast of Saturday Night Live for its fiftieth anniversary or the Jamaican bobsled team that inspired the 'Cool Runnings' film. Others are even more rare: a forest green jacket stitched with a floral and friendship bracelet motif for pop star Taylor Swift, and one adorned with snazzy sunglasses and piano key pockets that marked Elton John's retirement from touring, the lining of which features 56 years of albums. What they have in common is an origin story that began with the building Roach is standing in — the Roots leather factory in north Toronto. Chances are, if you bought a leather bag or jacket from the retailer, they came from the Caledonia Road site, which has given Roots bragging rights in an era where everyone wants to buy Canadian. 'Every time I bring someone through the factory, they kind of look at me and say, 'I just didn't realize you did this here,'' Roach said of the facility where dozens of workers cut leather, stitch it together, emboss it and ultimately, handcraft up to 8,000 pieces monthly. The Canadian operation is a rarity these days, after clothing manufacturing largely migrated overseas in the sixties, when brands wanted to reduce costs and offload repetitive and sometimes time-consuming tasks. Roots has not been entirely immune to the allure of international production. It sources some of its clothing in Asia and Europe, but designs everything in Canada, which remains the heart of its leather business. Domestic production has been 'very challenging,' Roach said. Canadian suppliers have been dwindling, so the company has had to look to Italy and France to source leather and even farther afield for zippers. For a time, it had a Canadian company helping it with piping on bags, but they went out of business, so Roots bought its machinery and trained staff to use it. The decision was a point of pride long before shoppers started letting patriotism rule their pocketbooks this year in hopes of countering U.S. President Donald Trump and his tariff whims. The moment has shoppers rallying around any company with a shred of Canadiana so Roach is determined not to let it slip away without customers learning more about the brand's, well, roots. Founders Michael Budman and Don Green were raised in Michigan but met at Camp Tamakwa in Ontario's Algonquin Park in 1963 and 10 years later, decided to head north of the border to start Roots. Initially, they specialized in negative-heel shoes, which reduced pressure on backs, but when the footwear sold out in less than a month and spawned a waiting list, Budman and Green dreamt bigger. They started pumping out varsity jackets, leather bags ideal for weekend getaways and salt-and-pepper sweats. Eventually, they became a Canadian staple with stores dotting the country, a discount airline shuttling people from coast to coast, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck starring in ads and a coveted contract to outfit the nation's Olympic team. Nowadays, the stores remain but the airline has folded, the business no longer sells shoes, ads aren't quite so star-studded and Lululemon Athletica Inc. outfits Team Canada. Budman and Green? They sold a majority stake in Roots in 2015 to Searchlight Capital Partners L.P., a firm split between Toronto, New York, Miami and London. Roach worked at the firm before joining Roots. When she took the top job in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic in May 2020, she was inheriting a brand Canadians adored but that needed to get some of its groove back. 'Because it's 50 years old, you have to be really careful in terms of how you modernize it,' she said. 'You can't just wake up one day and change everything, so we've been slowly over the last five or six years, making small tweaks and changes.' Having heard from customers who wanted less dominant logos on their clothes and softer fabrics across more products, Roach introduced new lines with minimal branding and expanded the brand's use of comfier materials. She sold the items in stores slowly being revamped to have a brighter and lighter feel that is less reminiscent of a cabin and more like a burst of freshness from the great outdoors. She also decided Roots needed to do a better job of telling its story, so it invested more heavily in digital marketing and brought on brand ambassadors. Some of those efforts are working because Roots appears to have stronger margins and renewed consumer interest, said Liza Amlani, principal of Retail Strategy Group in an email. But she still feels the brand has work to do because 'not all stores are consistent in the customer experience and many are packed to the brim with product' that needs to keep evolving if Roots wants to hang onto customers long after the buy Canadian bubble bursts. These days they're marketing a Canada collection of red-and-white apparel, T-shirts dedicated to local waterways like Okanagan Lake and leather goods like an emoji bag charm with maple leaves for eyes. Roach insists the unabashedly Canadian items aren't a sign that other markets aren't still a priority. When she joined Roots, she relaunched the brand in China and began plotting to expand its presence even further into the U.S., where it has two stores. Monday Mornings The latest local business news and a lookahead to the coming week. That plan is still on the table, even now that Trump has chosen Canada as one of his top tariff targets, because she says, 'there's a huge amount of potential there once we get through the current volatility.' 'The thing about being with a brand that's been around for 50 years is you have to look past the short-term nature … like not what's happening next month or next year but what's going to happen over the next 10 to 15 years,' she said after strolling the leather factory. 'You're thinking what do I have to do and invest in and what are the green shoots I have to build today for this business to be successful more over a longer period of time?' This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 16, 2025. Companies in this story: (TSX:ROOT)
Hamilton Spectator
16-06-2025
- Business
- Hamilton Spectator
Buy Canadian moment creates opportunity for Roots and its domestic leather business
TORONTO - Rifling through the Roots Corp. product archives on a recent Thursday morning, CEO Meghan Roach is surrounded by the kind of heritage 'most consumer brands would die to have.' In every direction she turns are racks of leather jackets spanning the company's 52 years. Some are replicas of custom pieces gifted to Toronto Raptors players for their 2019 championship win, the cast of Saturday Night Live for its fiftieth anniversary or the Jamaican bobsled team that inspired the 'Cool Runnings' film. Others are even more rare: a forest green jacket stitched with a floral and friendship bracelet motif for pop star Taylor Swift, and one adorned with snazzy sunglasses and piano key pockets that marked Elton John's retirement from touring, the lining of which features 56 years of albums. What they have in common is an origin story that began with the building Roach is standing in — the Roots leather factory in north Toronto. Chances are, if you bought a leather bag or jacket from the retailer, they came from the Caledonia Road site, which has given Roots bragging rights in an era where everyone wants to buy Canadian. 'Every time I bring someone through the factory, they kind of look at me and say, 'I just didn't realize you did this here,'' Roach said of the facility where dozens of workers cut leather, stitch it together, emboss it and ultimately, handcraft up to 8,000 pieces monthly. The Canadian operation is a rarity these days, after clothing manufacturing largely migrated overseas in the sixties, when brands wanted to reduce costs and offload repetitive and sometimes time-consuming tasks. Roots has not been entirely immune to the allure of international production. It sources some of its clothing in Asia and Europe, but designs everything in Canada, which remains the heart of its leather business. Domestic production has been 'very challenging,' Roach said. Canadian suppliers have been dwindling, so the company has had to look to Italy and France to source leather and even farther afield for zippers. For a time, it had a Canadian company helping it with piping on bags, but they went out of business, so Roots bought its machinery and trained staff to use it. The decision was a point of pride long before shoppers started letting patriotism rule their pocketbooks this year in hopes of countering U.S. President Donald Trump and his tariff whims. The moment has shoppers rallying around any company with a shred of Canadiana so Roach is determined not to let it slip away without customers learning more about the brand's, well, roots. Founders Michael Budman and Don Green were raised in Michigan but met at Camp Tamakwa in Ontario's Algonquin Park in 1963 and 10 years later, decided to head north of the border to start Roots. Initially, they specialized in negative-heel shoes, which reduced pressure on backs, but when the footwear sold out in less than a month and spawned a waiting list, Budman and Green dreamt bigger. They started pumping out varsity jackets, leather bags ideal for weekend getaways and salt-and-pepper sweats. Eventually, they became a Canadian staple with stores dotting the country, a discount airline shuttling people from coast to coast, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck starring in ads and a coveted contract to outfit the nation's Olympic team. Nowadays, the stores remain but the airline has folded, the business no longer sells shoes, ads aren't quite so star-studded and Lululemon Athletica Inc. outfits Team Canada. Budman and Green? They sold a majority stake in Roots in 2015 to Searchlight Capital Partners L.P., a firm split between Toronto, New York, Miami and London. Roach worked at the firm before joining Roots. When she took the top job in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic in May 2020, she was inheriting a brand Canadians adored but that needed to get some of its groove back. 'Because it's 50 years old, you have to be really careful in terms of how you modernize it,' she said. 'You can't just wake up one day and change everything, so we've been slowly over the last five or six years, making small tweaks and changes.' Having heard from customers who wanted less dominant logos on their clothes and softer fabrics across more products, Roach introduced new lines with minimal branding and expanded the brand's use of comfier materials. She sold the items in stores slowly being revamped to have a brighter and lighter feel that is less reminiscent of a cabin and more like a burst of freshness from the great outdoors. She also decided Roots needed to do a better job of telling its story, so it invested more heavily in digital marketing and brought on brand ambassadors. Some of those efforts are working because Roots appears to have stronger margins and renewed consumer interest, said Liza Amlani, principal of Retail Strategy Group in an email. But she still feels the brand has work to do because 'not all stores are consistent in the customer experience and many are packed to the brim with product' that needs to keep evolving if Roots wants to hang onto customers long after the buy Canadian bubble bursts. These days they're marketing a Canada collection of red-and-white apparel, T-shirts dedicated to local waterways like Okanagan Lake and leather goods like an emoji bag charm with maple leaves for eyes. Roach insists the unabashedly Canadian items aren't a sign that other markets aren't still a priority. When she joined Roots, she relaunched the brand in China and began plotting to expand its presence even further into the U.S., where it has two stores. That plan is still on the table, even now that Trump has chosen Canada as one of his top tariff targets, because she says, 'there's a huge amount of potential there once we get through the current volatility.' 'The thing about being with a brand that's been around for 50 years is you have to look past the short-term nature ... like not what's happening next month or next year but what's going to happen over the next 10 to 15 years,' she said after strolling the leather factory. 'You're thinking what do I have to do and invest in and what are the green shoots I have to build today for this business to be successful more over a longer period of time?' This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 16, 2025. Companies in this story: (TSX:ROOT)
Yahoo
24-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Malik Yoba No Longer Identifies As Black
2025 hasn't even seen three full months go by without a horde of unprecedented moments. Malik Yoba added to this by declaring that he no longer identifies as Black. 'America? I've decided that I'm no longer a Black man. I'm no longer a person of color, BIPOC, none of that sh*t,' the 57-year-old actor said in a video. 'What I am is a non-white man. And I think we should all just start calling ourselves non-white. So, they're gonna have to figure it out. Let them rebuke that. Let them refute it. Let them come up with something that just says, 'We like all non-whites.' Excuse me. 'We don't like all non-whites.'' On the surface, this comes off strange, but Willie D believes Yoba was on to something. 'Are you picking up what he's putting down?' he asked his YouTube audience in a video. 'Malik is trying to say is this: Trump Administration has rallied white folks to come together against everybody else and that the only way the rest of us individuals stand a chance is to consolidate our individual powers and make a collective effort to get what we want and what we need out of this Administration and out of this country.' The Houston rapper stated that he can 'dig that.' Watch the clip and more below. Malik Yoba's timing is interesting, given Donald Trump's executive order to eliminate all DEI initiatives in the workplace and matters concerning government funding. Trump believes this will restore 'fairness and accountability in federal hiring' and has even blamed an aircraft crash in Washington D.C. on DEI. The current President claimed that former President Joe Biden called his Aviation Administration workforce 'too white' and held the belief that they were 'psychologically superior' to the diversity hires. 'It just could have been. We have a high standard. We've had a much higher standard than anybody else. And there are things where you have to go by brainpower,' he told The Associated Press. 'You have to go by psychological quality, and psychological quality is a very important element of it.' More from 'Cool Runnings' Cast Reflect On Film's Creation: "They Wanted Me To Sound Like A Black Aladdin" William Dilday Jr., First Black TV Station Manager, Dies At 85 IRS Chief Admits Black Taxpayers More Likely To Face Audits
Arab News
13-02-2025
- Sport
- Arab News
Curl Runnings! Philippines bank on unlikely Winter Olympics berth
HARBIN, China: A banker, a construction worker, an electrician and an entrepreneur from snowy Switzerland have an unlikely shot at making Winter Olympics curling history — for the tropical Philippines. Jamaica's bobsleigh team were immortalized in the movie 'Cool Runnings' after taking part in the 1988 Winter Olympics. And the 'Curling Pilipinas' could be the next candidates for the Hollywood treatment, should they line up at Milan-Cortina in 2026. The Swiss-Filipino men's quartet are this week gaining invaluable experience at the Asian Winter Games in China, their biggest stage yet. Just two years after the launch of the country's curling federation, the men's team — who were all born in Switzerland to Filipino mothers — have already secured a place at 2026 Olympic pre-qualifiers later this year. Unlike their full-time competitors from Asian winter sports powerhouses South Korea, Japan and China, the Philippines team members still work their day jobs. 'We are fully committed, but the money is always tight,' said lead Alan Frei. 'But it's for the plot, it's for the story, right?' Frei has spent around 30,000 euro ($31,000) on the team, who were largely self-funded before the Asian Winter Games, according to Philippines curling federation president Benjo Delarmente, who is also the squad's reserve player. The Philippines are not intimidated going up against the best because of the team's top-tier chemistry, Frei told AFP during practice at the Harbin Pingfang District Curling Arena. 'It's just a great team dynamic,' said Frei, who describes himself as an 'e-commerce entrepreneur.' 'We love hanging out with each other. It's always funny, we are cracking jokes. So that's our big advantage.' They also have experience in their ranks. The other three members — electrician Enrico Pfister, his brother and construction worker Marc Pfister and banker Christian Haller — have previously competed for Switzerland in world championships. A few years ago the trio decided to form a Philippines team, but needed a fourth member. They contacted rookie curler Frei, 42, who had made it his life goal to become an Olympian and had only taken up the sport after realizing he had 'zero talent' for skiing. By October 2023 they were competing and the rest could be history. With temperatures in host city Harbin struggling to get above freezing it is a far cry from the Philippines, where the mercury regularly hits 30 Celsius (86F) at this time of year. The Philippines first sent athletes to the Winter Olympics in 1972, but sent a lone skier to the last Games in Beijing in 2022. They have never qualified anyone for a team event. Delarmente wants to elevate curling in the Philippines and find more talent from people of Filipino heritage around the world. Curling is the 'perfect' sport for Filipinos, he said, likening it to a combination of billiards, bowls and chess on ice. 'We're already having some followers watching our games and messaging us: 'How do we learn curling in the Philippines?'' Delarmente said. 'So we're getting there. 'People are getting to know more and more about curling in the Philippines, especially (now) that we've had so much success.' Curling fan Jojo Cruz, who grew up in the Philippines but now lives in the US, booked a trip to Harbin. 'I still can't believe that tropical countries have the opportunity to play in winter or snow sports,' Cruz told AFP. Cruz has lived in the US for about four decades but said he still at times feels like a foreigner there, holding on to his roots in the Philippines. 'I still have that connection, and I don't want to lose that,' said Cruz. But the 61-year-old, who curled for the Philippines at a senior world championship last year, failed to get tickets for the curling competitions, which have room for only around 200 spectators. But he was happy that the team were competing and said he was enjoying seeing different parts of the frigid city with his wife. 'I told myself, hey, this is a beautiful place. Harbin is nice. It's so cold, but it's fine.' For the latest updates, follow us @ArabNewsSport
