Klaus Brinkmann

Gladly. Bugatti is a well-known name in the fashion world. For those who may not yet be familiar with the house, could you perhaps briefly name some of the other brands that belong to it?

Yes, I believe for the entire clothing industry in the menswear segment, but also for us specifically, it is very important that silhouettes remain slim, but you have to feel comfortable in them. That means tailoring is more in demand than ever, and that is of particular significance for a quality brand like Bugatti. For spring-summer, the fabrics will once again be lighter and more finely woven. The colors, which last year were a bit more bold and aggressive, are now being dialed back somewhat, without losing their vibrancy. I think that's a good description of the trend that you can really visualize.

Actually through two ways. One is that because we don't operate in the low-price sector, we have always been able to afford, and therefore select, higher-quality production facilities around the world where we knew from the start that certain sustainability standards were in place. But being in place and being able to prove it at the end are two different things. So we have designated a person in our company who audits sustainability at the individual production sites abroad and ensures that if there are any doubts, they are analyzed and we receive the recommendations. So I would really claim that we can guarantee 100% that our products are produced sustainably.

There are two essential things for me. The first is the brand — we must keep the brand aspirational and premium through emotionalization and through outfit styling that guarantees added value for our consumer. On the other hand, we are also very strongly focused on the quality of our products. When I said tailoring is in demand again, that means qualitatively valuable production. We have really focused on this for the last years — I'd almost say decades — ensuring that this product quality, which is truly appreciated by the end consumer, we can maintain or even further enhance.

I believe I speak for many families and parents — nothing is more enjoyable than being active in a company where you know it will be continued within your own family. It's even more enjoyable to witness the next generation growing into it, when they find joy in this profession on their own, without pressure, and then also give us new impulses along the way. The younger generation is also there to push and motivate us older ones. When you experience that daily, it's a motor for yourself and for the generation. But to address your second question: in our companies we don't just need one or two executives — we need great employee potential. We can be moderators, motivators, and of course we must also be strategists, but without qualified and committed employees, it's not possible to run such a corporate group. So I believe everyone at our company has the chance — even as a non-family member — to climb the appropriate career ladder and work here responsibly and well.

We have always been represented at trade fairs, always appropriately matching each brand to the fair that we consider right for that brand. We need customers, like internationally — we find them at these fairs. But we also create, through our presentation at these fairs, ongoing inspiration and motivation for existing customers to realize they are with the right people, they have the right brands, they have the right products. So a functioning trade fair landscape is, I believe, very necessary in our clothing industry.

The ways of Mr. Müller from Bread & Butter are often hard to understand. But I want to give him some credit — without Karl-Heinz Müller, there might not be any trade fair in Germany at all, because Cologne had played itself out, Düsseldorf as a trade fair location had played itself out, and without Müller's initiative, Berlin would not have emerged. I think most people see it that way. The challenge for an innovative trade fair maker like Müller is, of course, to always reinvent himself. Fashion reinvents itself — we are in an incredibly dynamic and flexible industry. And he noticed, at least that's my impression, that his Bread & Butter was losing attractiveness, and he had to rethink things. He then decided on a hopping strategy, so to speak — Barcelona, then Berlin, then Seoul — without telling us whether everything might be reversed again in 2016. So right now his strategy is certainly hard to gauge. And that essentially makes the statements from exhibitors and dealers — customers — understandable when they find this unpredictability difficult. Nevertheless, this means for us — and I've been advocating this for many years — we can't just say we've been in Florence for 10 years so we'll be there for the next 5. We actually need to question ourselves season by season: which fair is of particular interest for which brand? And I'd say at least in the medium term. And we're now back in that decision-making phase, because Mr. Müller has brought our house Dressler into a decision-making crisis — do we follow to Barcelona or do we position ourselves differently? But I've never been afraid to analyze, to consider, and then make decisions. So it remains exciting.

Well, purely on instinct, I believe that Dressler will definitely not follow the move to Seoul, perhaps to Barcelona. But we are currently in that decision-making process, and I don't want to say something here that is not yet 100% decided.

But naturally — because I consider Berlin an attractive trade fair location, and we have thousands of customers there, both national and international — and should I not go to Barcelona with Dressler, then I believe we must come up with an alternative in Berlin. And that's exactly the evaluation we're currently in: which trade fair platform is right for a premium brand like Eduard Dressler. I don't want to dig any deeper into this complex and difficult topic.

Oh, I think that's a very, very difficult question because we still have so much potential to unlock and achieve that I almost don't want to commit to just one thing. We have grown very stably in recent years. What tends to irritate us, or not throw us off track but cause difficulties, is actually when markets encounter problems due to entirely unrelated situations that none of us are responsible for. So in that sense, I'll come to a wish after all: I wish that situations like the ones now developing in the Eastern Bloc, specifically in Russia and Ukraine, which also affect our business and unsettle our customers — I wish we are spared those in the future.