reveries.com - steve fuller

APRIL 2001

The guy at L.L. Bean who runs the outdoor sports division has an agreement with Steve Fuller. Steve gets his customers when they’re done sleeping in tents.

Those customers are forty-five to fifty-five years old. They're incredibly educated. Steve calls them "culturally curious." They are early adopters. They were some of the first people on the Web. They have museum scores and art scores through the roof. Naturally, their outdoor scores are through the roof, too.

"Those are my customers," says Steve. "I love them. They're interesting people -- the kind of people who would be fun to have at a dinner party. They grew up on L.L. Bean, and now that they've written their child's last tuition check they're ready to step out and travel."

They just don't want to sleep in tents anymore.

As VP and general manager of Traveler -- L.L. Bean’s newest business enterprise -- Steve Fuller is on the front lines of a remarkable transition. Formerly a single company with a single store -- and a single catalog -- L.L. Bean is now expressing its heritage in new ways. Traveler is one of those ways. Traveler is a special catalog -- and magazine, really -- for Bean customers who are also travel enthusiasts. Under Steve’s able aegis, Traveler has enjoyed a tripling of sales since its launch less than two years ago. Steve also co-engineered the high-profile co-branding effort between L.L. Bean and Subaru.

But while Bean may be altering its business model, it is not changing its charter. It always comes back to basic concepts of quality, authenticity and Bean's famous guarantee. It's a guarantee that only a certain confidence of quality and authenticity could deliver. Not coincidentally, Bean's authenticity is also Steve's -- born and reared, he was, in Maine. He even attended Bates College, in Lewiston, Maine. After graduating, he spent time learning retail the hard way at his father’s Maine-based car dealerships. About that, Steve has this story that he likes to tell:

"A couple comes in. I know the couple. I went to school with their daughter, who had just gone off to college. They come into the dealership and they want to get the biggest station wagon that Ford sells. I say, 'Jeez, are you sure, with Suzie off to college and with Cheryl going next year, do you really need a Ford Fairlane?' They said, 'You know, we’ve thought about this, and we really would like this.' Then I said, 'Well, are you sure?' My dad was sitting behind this glass that has a curtain over it, and I hear this tapping. I see him take his finger and crook it towards me.

I go into his office and I say, “What?" He said, 'What do they want?' I said, 'Well they want to get this big Ford Fairlane, but they really don’t need one. They really need an Escort.' My father says, 'Sell them the Ford Fairlane, Steve. That’s what they want to buy. That’s what they want to have. It’s their decision.' And it sounds corny, but boy, I’ll tell you, he’s absolutely right. You’re there to serve the customer."

Maybe I'm finally maturing here -- although my wife would disagree!

After a year in the car business, Steve began a nine-year stretch with Yankee Magazine, most of it in Boston. Steve rose quickly from market research to marketing director. In his last two years, he ran one of the magazine’s travel-focused units.

Then it was back to Maine -- this time to join the folks of the world-famous unconditional guarantee, long one of Yankee Magazine's biggest advertisers. He started out setting circulation strategies for Bean’s hard-goods, outdoor sports, and home & camp business groups. He then oversaw advertising, loyalty and customer acquisition for all of Bean -- including launching L.L. Bean’s affinity credit card with Visa, now used by over a million households.

Then along came Traveler. As always, Steve is staying right at "home" with Bean’s unrelenting commitment to satisfying consumers unconditionally -- with quality. And authenticity.

L.L. Bean is an incredibly authentic company. It all starts with just one guy -- Leon Gorman, who took the helm of the company in 1967. Leon inherited the company from his grandfather, Leon Leonwood Bean, when it was a three million dollar company. Today, it's over a billion-dollar company. One guy made that happen. One guy. It's because he's so absolutely committed to the ideals of customer satisfaction.

The way Leon sees it, our guarantee is the umbrella over L.L. Bean. It's outdoor products with a hundred percent guarantee of satisfaction. Within that there is the golden rule -- sell good products at a reasonable profit, treat your customers like human beings and they'll always come back for more. But then he takes it down to the quality of products, and he says, "Look, the product has to be just as good as the guarantee."

There's also the direct-to-consumer pricing -- which I'll admit that we're not always that good at communicating to our customers. When you go into the typical store to buy a suitcase, the person selling it is making a fifty percent margin; the wholesaler is making a fifty percent margin; and the manufacturer is making a fifty percent margin. But if you go from factory to consumer, you're able to reinvest those savings in both better quality and typically a better price.

These principles have to be reinforced in every L.L. Bean catalog. You have to remind customers about direct-to-consumer pricing. It's something that can be overcomplicated but really boils down to, "This comes with the L.L. Bean guarantee -- and in case you've forgotten, here's a friendly reminder." There are a lot of things I can do differently with Traveler. New products, new services, a different creative look. But the 100 percent guarantee of satisfaction and Golden Rule will never change.

Traveler visually looks very different than the traditional Bean catalogs. It's a cleaner, somewhat more sophisticated design, and with locations like Paris and Hawaii -- certainly different than other L.L. Bean catalogs. But we actually do a lot to stay aligned with Bean's heritage. While I may have a contemporary look or shoot the catalog in Santa Fe, you always see people enjoying the outdoors. It's those little things that reinforce Traveler's roots and our customers' expectations of L.L. Bean.

Bean, in its heart, is an outdoor company. It started around a set of Maine hunting shoes. You could make the argument, "Outdoors? But your home business sells couches and rugs." That's true, but those products are directly influenced by -- or built around -- an outdoor lifestyle. There's simplicity in care and design that goes hand-in-hand with our customer's love of the outdoors."

Direct marketing is an intensely quantitative business. But the creativity is there. It's just a different type of creativity.

When I first arrived at Bean, I had a hard time accepting some of the dynamics around the company’s direct marketing efforts. The metrics regarding customer retention, customer acquisition costs, and so forth, are incredible. Until you actually see it -- and see it in historical perspective -- you don't believe it. But at Bean, there are years of results and learning that support the data and guide our efforts.

Personally, I was really intrigued by the relationships between the customer file and the natural ebbs and flows of certain product groups or activities. For example, hunting is a sport with relatively low recent growth rates -- customer retention is critical to that business. On the other hand, our home business has seen tremendous growth -- new customer acquisition plays a much bigger role in the marketing mix.
Two years ago, L.L. Bean underwent a significant change in thinking. After being one "brand" for eighty-five years, the company's growth had slowed and started to present some real organizational challenges. Though a subsequent strategic review, L.L. Bean recognized that it might be overlooking some potential future growth areas. And this growth could be best accomplished by reorganizing into strategic business units that would bring back some of the entrepreneurial spirit that founded the organization.

You can't imagine how big a change this represented to the company. Nearly every single person changed work units. Many totally changed their jobs. At the time I was running the company's advertising and customer retention efforts. I had worked in travel industry at Yankee Magazine, so as part of the reorganization at Bean, I was asked to pull together a business plan for a new travel business for the company. The result was Traveler and it's been a wonderful success.”

I think three things are responsible for Traveler's results. First, I believe the travel industry is just starting an extended growth period. Last year Fortune magazine reported that baby boomer travel was one of the 10 trends that would shape the next millennium. You've got the single biggest population group in history just entering its prime travel years -- 50 plus.

Combine that with the L.L. Bean customer file. The customers that first started shopping with us during the "preppy boom" in the late-seventies and early eighties are now in their mid to late forties. As their kids get older and move on into their own lives, these customers are going to start traveling much more frequently.

The company also has a long history in the luggage and travel business. I often joke that if the Maine Hunting Shoe was the first product L.L. built, the second was our ZD Duffle bag. We even own a luggage factory in Brunswick, Maine, just a few miles up the road from our Freeport offices. Traveler was intended to fill any product holes that might have prevented us from being a full service provider to these customers.

Traveler, ultimately, has to be about products and how those items can ultimately be of service to our customers. Travel is a fun activity. It's about new places, new activities and let's face it -- who doesn't look forward to a vacation?

I received an email one day from a photographer who said he had some ideas on how to make a better photo vest and camera bag. So we hired him to design a vest and bag. He's doing photography for us now, too.

One of the dangers that I fight with Traveler is the occasional drift into being a third-rate travel magazine. Our typical customer has been with us for a long time and they respect us for our product expertise. While they might appreciate our opinions regarding a restaurant in San Francisco or a secluded beach we found on a photo shoot in Hawaii, ultimately they want to know more about the products and how they were designed and manufactured.

We learned in the first few issues that our opinions were best left in the margins – over on the side, out of the way of the actual products. Whenever I write one of those margin notes, I get wonderful emails from customers saying "I know where that restaurant is," or "I like that book too." But we really have to be diligent about not letting the margin notes take over the book. What my customer really wants to know is, "Can I take these shoes with me on a walking tour of Ireland?"

Our co-branding relationship with Subaru is also based on classic L.L. Bean principles. Over the years, every car manufacturer imaginable had literally approached the company about a relationship. At about the same time we were going through the reorganization, our advertising agency was contacted by one of the larger auto manufacturers about an introduction to L.L. Bean. Coincidentally, another got in touch with us directly. Given the interest, we thought it might be time for a closer look.

At roughly the same time, the organization “Leave No Trace” was here in Freeport for a meeting. The idea of an automobile relationship came up in discussion and they said "You should speak with Subaru. You’d be a perfect match."

We were already sharing a program with Subaru through Leave No Trace. This is an educational program that promotes outdoor responsibility through the work of "traveling trainers" -- people who go around the country and speak to outdoor groups, schools, and so forth. Subaru was donating the cars, L.L. Bean was donating the gear. So we met with Subaru and really hit it off. We especially liked the responsiveness and maneuverability that a relatively small auto company was able to provide.

For example, one of our criteria was that we wanted to have a better guarantee on an L.L. Bean Edition than other cars. If it was going to have our name on it, there had to be a legitimate reason. Subaru said, "We'll extend the warranty on your car. We'll let you help us design the styling and help select the features. And we'll give you a one year exclusive on our first 6 cylinder engine." A bigger manufacturer couldn't have helped us with that differentiation.

Another of our criteria in this program is that we wanted to somehow "thank" customers for making the purchase. A new car can range from twenty to forty thousand dollars and we thought a thank-you might be a nice gesture. Subaru helped us set up a program where approximately two weeks after purchasing your L.L. Bean Edition, you'll receive a Federal Express package containing a specially designed Boat & Tote.

People tend to make things too complicated. Traveler is a very simple idea. It basically says, "We have customers who like our products who also like to travel, so let's make something for them that they'll like and they'll find interesting." In the end it's about simple things, but not necessarily the most obvious things.

One of the most obvious ways to talk about the outdoors is from an extreme perspective. It's man against the elements, the steepest mountain -- all that stuff. Occasionally, we do something a little different like that. But ninety percent of our positioning is along the practical enjoyment of the outdoors. That can make it a lot harder to be creative, but that's how Bean positions itself.

For some people, that steepest mountain is their vision of the outdoors, and we should be there to help them enjoy that. But for a lot of people it's something else again. It's a light hike with their kids on a little local mountain. It's accessible. That whole accessibility and practicality is part of Bean and the Bean experience.