Word: polegato
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...decided to launch before the crisis started, and we continued along our path," says Mario Polegato, the chairman and founder of GEOX, a $1.2 billion company (at current exchange rates) whose shares are listed on the Milan Stock Exchange. "In this economic situation, the best thing for a company is to offer innovative products. It's the only way out of the crisis." (See which businesses are bucking the recession...
...golf stop the slump? Polegato insists that his customers have asked that GEOX create a comfy golf shoe. "Golf is a perfect environment for GEOX technology," he says. "You walk long hours, often on a damp surface, and in warm if not hot climates. Why suffer with your feet? In the third millennium, it is impossible that people still suffer from such a basic problem as sweaty, smelly feet." Right on, Mario. The problem for GEOX, however, is that the world's economy may stink even worse...
...Polegato's timing might not be as bad as it seems. While footwear in general, and especially luxury shoes, has suffered in the recession, athletic shoes have not taken as hard a hit. In fact, after the $17.5 billion U.S. athletic footwear market saw flat sales in '08, sneakers are actually up 6% so far this year, according to SportsOneSource, a research firm. Further, while the overall golf business is stuck in the rough - U.S. equipment sales, for example, have dropped 9% this year - spikes have sold relatively well. In the United States, the $500 million golf shoe market...
...Italian shoemaker, however, could be the company that exceeds expectations. After all, it's been doing just that throughout its brief history. Polegato started the company in 1995, six years after an-hour long walk through the Reno, Nev., desert compelled him to take out a Swiss army knife and poke holes in the rubber soles. He wanted to know if the holes would increase the ventilation in his sweaty feet; turns out they did. Polegato was in Reno to promote his family's Northern Italian wineries, but upon returning to Italy he pursued a ventilation technology (no more Swiss...
...from $9.5 million to $163 million. More recently, however, GEOX hasn't escaped the slowdown. After a decade of double-digit annual profit growth, net income flattened out in 2008. The stock has dropped 54% over the past year. "At the moment, the shoes business is very difficult," says Polegato. "I believe, however, that GEOX is in a great situation, because we can mix technology and style...
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