INTERVIEW > Good vibes with the VIBAe Founders

Crispy > It is great to meet you both, happy new year, I hope that you have started 2024 well for you?

Ludo > Yes we have just been away, we have this old Airstream, a 1976 model, that we wanted to renovate. So we gutted it with the intention that I was going to rebuild it myself however it turned out that was way too ambitious. So after a bit of searching we found a place in Utah that does that kind of renovation work and we went over and picked up there last week. While we were in Utah it snowed with 6 feet of snow. So manoeuvring the van through feet of snow, was a (challenging) experience. Ultimately it’s going to become a mobile showroom for VIBAe but for right now it is still all mine.

Crispy > So tell the back story, how did this start?

Ludo > I started working for an Australian company Royal Elastics, they were making some really funky footwear and they were acquired by K-Swiss which is what brought us to California.

Ludo > We then launched another shoe brand, OTZ shoes which was really successful. Growing our first business it was Tammy and I and literally a handful of people that had to do everything. We sold the business in 2013 and worked there for a few more years before departing the business in 2017. We took a few years off and then our distributor for OTZ shoes, Kalle and Minna in Finland said “get of your ass, lets do something”. So we got on a plane went over there and hung out with them, which was cool as they had become some of our best friends.

We headed out into Finland and spent three weeks in a camper van, driving up and down Finland it was marvellous and bloody cold. The beauty of Finland is they have the most amazing cabins which all have a sauna. We spent the three weeks together in nature planning the business. If we were going to start a new brand it had to be relevant to what is happening today, we live on a planet and there are so many bad things done to it.

So we are going to make some shoes that are not going to harm the environment. So we came up with VIBAe that means ‘good vibes’ in Finnish. The little ‘e’ stands for fuckin’ everything, ergonomic, ecological. We use sustainable materials, vegetable tannins that don’t pollute rivers or anything like that, natural rubber (non petroleum product), organic linens with almost no pesticides. Sourcing the materials is so important to us. The other ‘e’ is ethical and it was important that we produced the shoes ethically and they are ethically made in Portugal.

Crispy > So you are based in Malibu California and your partners are in Helsinki does it work?

Tammy > It works so well, Kalle and Minna work in the store in Helsinki and Hannu who runs our IT… It is a friends and family business, Kalle’s sister and her husband run the Barcelona store and the customer support too.

Crispy > So you manufacture in Portugal, which is well known for having an excellent heritage in manufacturing shoes.

Ludo > Yes that is right, the factories in Portugal and they are family run, it is a team of artisans who build they shoes. They are all set in the villages and they are all very close to the local environment. So being a sustainable construction is really important to them as well as us.

Crispy > And Portugal is a lovely place to spend time too?

Tammy > Yes well that was the other side, perhaps the selfish side of it, we all like our wine and travel, its a great place to meet.

Crispy > It feels like the brand has gathered incredible traction quickly. I recently purchased another pair of your Zuma’s (black this time) because they are such a comfortable shoe but amazing for travelling, slide them on and off or walk in them for hours. You can dress them up or down. Is that a key part of your brand identity?

Ludo > We have a bricks and mortar business with stores here in Malibu California, Helsinki, Barcelona, Tokyo, Seoul and our son is about to move to Australia next month to open a store in Sydney and do the fulfilment for Australia out of Australia.

But we grew this business as an ecommerce business and most of our sales are online. We spend about €150,000 euros per month on Instagram and Facebook advertising to drive the ecommerce platform.

Crispy > You launched during the COVID pandemic which was really brave, did that turn out to ultimately be positive for the business?

Ludo > Launching a business during COVID was kind of lucky for us in someways, people were stuck at home and they needed comfortable shoes. During COVID you were wanting to be comfortable but to be able to dress it up a little bit as well. Our shoes became a hit because they were super comfortable and they fit what ever you wear.

Crispy > stepping up from Ugg Boots

Ludo > yes actually, and also people coming to our stores which were not in shopping malls rather they are all stores that face out to the street. So we were allowed to open our stores. A bunch of luck and being in the right place at the right time.

Crispy > Tell us how you created the design.

Ludo > Ergonomics is part of the semantics of design and designing a product that responds to the body, how the foot moves and how the body changes. This experience became the basis of what I know.

With VIBAe it came down to your feet, lets design a shoe that is the shape of your feet. Lets provide the cushioning that you need without creating a heel. When you are born, your heel and forefoot is flat to the ground, its called barefoot. We added a footbed because we all live in a concrete jungle, we need some comfort. This is a shoe that will let you stand comfortably in it for 8 hours a day.

Our shoes have an incredible sock liner inside, what we call the carbon fit footbed. It contours your foot, its anti microbial and gives you a nice amount of cushioning. The toe box fits the shape of your feet and they feel great.

We deconstructed how shoes are made, removed everything you don’t need and rebuilt it and this is what it looks like. Shoes are gloves for the feet.

Crispy > I was thinking about the recent take up of Birkenstocks a brand that has been around

Ludo > Since 1774

Crispy > Yes and historically worn by chef’s and hippies, but they have a footbed that is very comfortable to stand in for long periods of time. In recent years they have become fashionable alongside brands like Crocs. Do you think that has helped with the VIBAe success?

Tammy > Yes and of course Birkenstock was bought by the Louis Vitton Group about a year ago and now they have broadened out beyond the classic sandal, they have sneakers and a bunch of different designs. I think its a wonderful thing that they have brought attention to comfortable shoes being fashionable too.

Ludo > The Birkenstock trend massively helped us.

Tammy > And its perennial, its like blue jeans, they are not going away.

Ludo > Because we both work at the VIBAe store, we hear lots of stories. People will come in wearing Birkenstocks and say once they are broken in that they are fantastic but it takes a while to break in and the process can be frickin vicious around your heel.

We have customers who come in wearing their ‘Birkies’ and walk out wearing VIBAe because they are so comfortable. The VIBAe feel the similar on the footbed, but they are more comfortable and more fashionable.

Tammy > And what we offer is instant gratification, you don’t have a breaking in period.

Ludo > We definitely rode the coat tails of the Birkenstock trend, but here in the US we also have a wholesale business, selling to retailers, brick and mortar stores. The majority of the stores we sell to are Birkenstock retailers, one of the biggest chains carrying our range is ‘Birkenstock of San Diego’.

They are stores that are now multi brand but they still sell Birkenstock along with other shoe brands that bring something special.

Crispy > Unlike many purely online brands you do have hero stores in Malibu, Helsinki etc. So how much of the business is bricks and mortar rather than online sales?

Ludo > It is growing, but we are about 90% online and about 10% brick and mortar. It is an area we are going to grow and our aspiration is that it grows to become about 30% of sales. It’s a twofold strategy, firstly you get to try the shoes on somewhere and secondly it drives your ecommerce business as well.

We entice people, so they come in here (to the stores) and we say shoes, booze and schmooze you can not lose… So come and talk to us and have a glass of wine if you come on a Saturday we often have some tapas its great.

Crispy > Where are the majority of your sales coming from right now?

Ludo > Well at the moment 43% of our sales come from the US and they are online. We are lucky we are a unisex brand 55% women and 45% men. When you are a shoe brand the ability to sell to both genders is great, its a safe guard almost. Our consumers love a minimalist approach to design, they love the materials and the eco-sensitive side and most importantly the comfort. Finally the barefoot component is becoming more important.

Crispy > Where is the store going to be in Sydney?

Ludo > We haven’t signed a lease yet we are looking at Bondi and Surry Hills because these are areas we lived and know well. We have also been looking at Gertude Street in Melbourne, it would be an awesome location there at some stage. Our son has a thousand pairs of shoes arriving and he has a store set up.

The great thing about working in the store and Kale, Minna, Tammy and I are all in the store and we listen to our customers and that informs what we design and range. Michelle who works here in the store wants gold VIBAe so I have to at least make some samples or she won’t talk to me anymore.

Crispy > I do love the leather sneaker, because it transitions to be a bit more dressy I can wear it to dinner, walking around town and its smart enough for the office. So is this a new direction because it was a big step from the sandal and boot to the sneaker?

Ludo > Yes our shoes are really minimal, but Kalle wanted a sneaker and they are more complex to manufacture. It was important to us that any shoe we do would embody the principles of VIBAe. So we started again and we fully deconstructed the sneaker and totally rebuilt it to work with our footbed.

Then we took it to our production in Portugal and they said you can’t do this it wont work. I said just try it, just because it hasn’t been done like that before, doesn’t mean it won’t work. So they tried it and it works.

So just like the other VIBAe shoes, you can pull the footbed out and you can roll the sneaker in your hand. It was important, I wanted the sneakers to look like sneakers but to be VIBAe comfortable. So it became a discussion between us, is that VIBAe?

But VIBAe is the comfort story, the simplicity on how we do things, the minimalist approach to design making, you don’t need to design a sneaker to look like a sandal. We deconstructed it and built it to feel like all our other shoes and maintains our story, our vibe the VIBAe.

So now I am super proud of it, super happy, it is the same vibe, the same story, it is comfort.

Crispy > Tell us about the VIBAe packaging and presentation because it looks great but its also functional. Johnny Ives (long time creative director at Apple) did something incredible to transform how the world thinks about packaging with the work he did for Apple. But packaging shouldn’t be expensive and full of materials that will end up dumped as waste in landfill, packaging needs to be smart and utilitarian.

Ludo > Absolutely, the idea behind the VIBAe box is to be eco aware, not creating more waste. It is functional in storing the shoe in stores.

When customers buy the shoes they take the box and we don’t have an extra bag. It is a shoe, in a box, in a bag. The drawstring on the box makes it functional handle and they walk out holding it.

Tammy > The logo is large on the box but it is also subtle, it is a black box with the drawstring and the customer walks out with our brand in their hand.

Ludo > Our range of shoes are for life, we are not creating seasonal brands we building a range of shoes that people will buy again and again.

Kalle > So how did you find the brand? I was looking and you have bought a couple of pairs.

Crispy > Well my wife originally found the brand on Instagram and bought me the Helsinki boot and then I went back and bought the Roma Sandal (which I am wearing) and then I got the Chocolate Zuma.

Then you launched the sneaker so I bought that and I just bought another pair of Zuma’s in black. Because they are so comfortable but also so functional.

I took the Helsinki boot and the sneaker to Japan recently because they can both be dressed up and can also be worn all day when you are walking across the city.

But then it started to snow so I changed to snow boots.

Kalle > We have been wearing our Helsinki boots here all winter and even when its -20c they are still super comfortable with warm socks. But they are not waterproof, so we are thinking about a ‘Galosh’.

Crispy > Tammy showed me a prototype of the Galosh, it looks a great addition, its modular and extends an already comfortable shoe to different scenarios.

Kalle > yes but our shoes are super flexible and wearing them makes it feel like you are not wearing shoes at all, but when you put that rubber on top of it, you can feel it. A little bit different. We don’t know yet.

Roma is our number one seller, over 50% of our sales come from the Roma sandal. We are not a fashion brand, we are a lifestyle brand. Roma works really well for all sorts of people even fashion people.

Kalle > You know we are doing a collaboration with Comme des Garçons on the Roma Sandal. Minna and I went to Paris last summer for the fashion week and once we arrived back to Finland we actually understood the dimension of our collaboration with CdGH when people came up to us and said WOW what a way to start collaborations… straight from the top!

Minna > Yes they say your first collaboration is with Comme des Garçons wow, ok. This is the perfect fusion of elegance style and cutting edge design. Its about embracing comfort as the ultimate fashion statement.

Kalle > My goal is to see our brand grow to be bigger than Marimeko, it is something that would make me very proud. My sister worked at Marimeko and my mum worked there for 30 years it an institution in Finland. We would love to collaborate with them and do something in Linen and maybe leather.

We have another collaboration with a Finish brand Onar which will be a long haired sheepskin version of that shoe in long hair sheepskin.

Kalle > We are still a really small company, we have all our family working with us. My mum is retired and works on Saturdays at the store. My sister runs the store in Barcelona and now she is behind our customer care. Minna’s father is doing some racks where we keep the shoes in the store. Its a family business and many of our friends are also working with us.

Also do you know Ludo and Tammy’s son is moving to Sydney to launch the store there?

And Ludo’s long time friend Dallas runs the Tokyo store.

Kalle > We are really open about our business, we have to struggle to build the brand, we are a small brand and yet we have to spend €100-150k every month on Instagram and Facebook advertising. But that is so much more than most Finnish brands invest even the big brands don’t spend anything like what VIBAe spend to introduce and grow the brand.

We have a media agency in London who have helped us a lot to grow the brand internationally. Many Finnish brands when they want to grow internationally they go to Sweden, not the rest of the world.

Minna > We are a Finnish Californian brand. We had worked with Ludo with OTZ and that sold and a few years past. So we called Ludo and asked what do you think about making a Finnish shoe brand manufactured in Portugal or Spain and right away Ludo and Tammy said they want to be a partner.

Kalle > They were taking time off, hiking, cycling, travelling and having a good time. Now all their money goes into VIBAe but of course there is already growth.

Minna > We are from Finland and we have the passion! as you see! You hardly have a chance to ask a question.

Kalle > We live the brand 24*7. VIBA means good vibes in Finnish. We love to work at our store, we have one in Helsinki and a summer store in the south of Finland. Our summer is short so..

Minna > five or six weeks

Kalle > yeah, we always go ourselves. When we have a customer coming in, I say hi, hello, whatever and then I say you get good vibes from here. But you have to put the VIBAe shoes on to get those good vibes.

Minna > Its our life. I think we are supposed to be more proud. We know what we have, we have gold in our hand. But online people can only see the shoe in the picture and sometimes it is good to have them in a store where they can try them on.

Kalle > We are mainly online and trying to sell comfort, it is not the easiest way to show the customer….

Minna > ….How comfortable the shoe is. Its number one when the customer puts the shoe on and they smile and they get the same vibes and feelings. This is not just a shoe. The world is full of shoes. The feeling of our shoes are something different.

Kalle > My sister has taken over the customer care but originally I was doing that, trying to run the business and do the customer care 24 x 7. First thing in the morning and last thing in the evening, I was tired but I loved it because I was in touch with the customers online and there I saw that many of our customers thought that we were a big company, but when they found out that one of the founders was answering the questions they thought that is unbelievable.

Kalle > Our shoes are comfy and the good vibes and our customers are super nice. The first reaction I get from customers who come to our stores, I talk a lot, I go on my knees and put the shoe on the customers foot, old school and I talk a lot. But once I put the shoe on the customers feet and I shut up. I take a step back and let the product itself talk and ninety nine times out of a hundred the customer smiles. They take the first steps and say where have the shoes been, why have I not had these before. We tell them they feel ok now but just wait, wear them for a while and they become even better. The customers are how can they come better, they already feel so good.

Minna > Most people who come into the store don’t know that we are the owners, it is not normal for the owners to be working in the store. So sometimes they want to take a photo with us, because we talk a lot and we are like friends for them already.

Kalle > We created a face for the brand, we get along with everybody. It doesn’t matter where I am walking, if I see someone wearing our shoes I always talk to them. Sometimes Minna my wife drags me away. The feedback we get from our customers, an older gentleman stopped by our store just before Christmas, he has our shoes but he just dropped in to talk. He told us that when he walks down town and if he sees someone else wearing VIBAe shoes he says hello. How cool is that.

Our customers, they buy the first pair and then the second and so on. Our customer are brand ambassadors, friends, relatives but even strangers. If an old customer is in the store when a new customer who doesnt have the shoes yet and an old customer comes in who owns our shoes, we take a step back because the old customer will almost sell the shoes for us.

Crispy > That is so powerful.

Minna > People have changed, I think that they want to live in a more healthy way and shoes that are comfy.

Kalle > You spend most of your time on your feet or sleeping, so you need good shoes and a good mattress. Our view is you need good shoes, well being starts with your feet and when they feel good so does the rest of your body.

Minna > Because we are so minimalistic it doesn’t matter if you are a young skater or ninety years old, both can wear the same shoes.

Kalle > We see we are a shoe for everybody.

Crispy > Ugg boots, Crocs and Birkenstocks have all become fashionable shoes they are comfortable but not functional. The VIBAe brand is actually a cross over.

Kalle > Actually you look at those shoes and then look at our shoes, we are a comfort brand and our shoes can look sexy, you make them sexy.

Crispy > I think the Galosh and the Helsinki Shearling boot is really sexy. I can imagine that being a future collaboration with Comme de Garcons.

Minna > You know you can wear the footbed inside a the long woollen sock and then wear the galosh without shoes and its really comfortable. It could be a new fashion!

Kalle > I like to say Monday is the best day of the week because we are going back to work but we have seven day a week jobs, but when you do something that you love you smile.