As one of the oldest and best-known fashion brands globally, you might not think Levi’s would have to do much to engender loyalty, but the company works hard to keep customers engaged and has just unveiled its loyalty programme in four new countries.

The programme currently has 38 million members globally and that number should receive a boost as it rolls out to Ireland, Denmark and Poland with Switzerland set to join the group in June.

The Red Tab member programme is part of the American denim giant’s aim of accelerating its DTC-first strategy in Europe. And it’s having an impact, with members being among the most valuable and engaged of its customers. That means the Red Tab extension has the potential to dynamically drive the bottom line sales-wise far beyond the mere number of regular customers the brand has in the programme’s new countries.

The company said this “is a key step in Levi’s commitment to delivering a seamless, omnichannel shopping experience that helps build fans for life” in one of its key market regions.

As mentioned, Red Tab, which was first unveiled in 2020, is currently getting close to 40 million consumers signed up. In Europe, it’s currently available in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, and the Czech Republic, with the new additions bringing it to 12 European countries in total.

Leona De Graft, VP of E-Commerce at Levi Strauss & Co Europe, said the expansion “is a key enabler of our DTC-first and omnichannel evolution. By integrating digital and in-store experiences, the programme strengthens our ability to deliver a connected, convenient, and rewarding shopping journey across all touchpoints. But we are not just driving loyalty—we are building lifelong Levi’s fans through unique benefits such as our in-store tailoring service to both customise and repair denim garments. With Red Tab, our members truly Live in Levi’s”. 

The programme is “designed to make Levi’s fans’ journey with the brand more seamless, more enjoyable and lifelong”. Members get premium benefits with an extended product guarantee and lifetime access to tailoring services, including repairs. 

Central to it are coins, earned on every purchase, redeemable for vouchers to shop online or in-store. Additional perks include free shipping, birthday surprises and early access to exclusive collabs. Member Days also give fans access to concert tickets, curated trips and events across Europe. The European-wide nature of the programme mean members retain their benefits in all the countries where it’s available.

And in an omnichannel retail world, Red Tab is also “the biggest connecter between the store and digital environment”.

The inside view

FashionNetwork.com asked Leona De Graft to give us some more insight into what the company and its consumers get out of Red Tab.

FNW: Can you explain what you do and what the programme is all about?

LDG: “I have the joy of leading our loyalty proposition for Europe. In January 2024 we announced our growth plan which is focused on us growing into a $10 billion business by 2027. Our DTC channels continue to outpace our growth across Europe but key to this strategy is loyalty. It’s firmly at the heart of everything we want to do. There’s lots of things it drives for us but I’d start by saying the fact that we can connect to our consumers directly is really, really important. We gain more consumer insights and it means we can be even sharper with the way we communicate with them. 

“It also means we can personalise the shopping experience. We can provide really tailored recommendations beyond just denim bottoms. It really aligns with our strategy, making sure that we pivot to new categories and build our portfolio outside of just jeans.”

FNW: How important is Red Tab to Levi’s and how important is Europe within it?

LDG: “The loyalty programme is a lot for us outside of just driving retention rates. We have over 38 million members and Europe is around a third, just with the markets that we have live now. We’ll be expanding that hopefully in the future as well. We continue to see really strong growth in our member acquisition numbers [and] we see more engagement from our consumers when they’re part of the Red Tab loyalty programme. [We see] how frequently they’re engaging in shopping our brand and we see much stronger customer active rates for our red tab consumers. 

“They’re actually worth more from a value point of view. And they also drive over 50% of our DTC revenue.”

FNW: Can you tell us about the benefits and how the programme is developing. 

LDG: “With any loyalty programme the great thing is that we get lots of insights and data. This won’t necessarily be the loyalty programme that we keep in the long run [as] we’re constantly iterating and improving [it]. We want to accelerate as quickly as possible so as quickly as we can move and expand [it] while also making sure that consumers feel it’s beneficial for them, we’ll do that. Making sure that it’s the right programme is important for us. 

“There are lots of great benefits. We have a good mixture between transactional, emotional and experiential. Core to our programme are coins. We also offer free shipping free returns, the standard transaction benefits. But what’s exciting are the differentiators. A key differentiator for us is actually our tailor shops and you have a tailor shop benefit as a Red Tab member where you can access repairs and also reimagine your Levi’s product. You can crop your jeans, have them hemmed, add some patches — you can really express yourself. And Red Tab members also get an extended product guarantee — for life. We stand by the fact that our product is quality, it’s durable. The experiential benefits are really strong too, music for instant is a core part of our marketing strategy and our DNA as a brand and we want to make sure we can unlock some of that experience for our members. 

“We have competitions, loyalty pop-ups at the best music events across Europe. A recent example is All Points East in the UK where we had a tailor shop pop-up. 

FNW: You’re based in London, do you oversee the entire loyalty programme across Europe?

LDG: I’m in London and I handle all of Europe [but] I have a team that stretches across six countries. Where we have specialist needs or we have countries where we want to make sure that we’re growing we have loyalty managers based in those countries as well. We want to make sure that the programme is tailored to each country as well as to each person and we want to make sure that it’s localised. 

FNW: Where do the stores fit in?

LDG: [Red Tab] also means that we’re closer to our stores. Retail is a key ‘unlock’ to our loyalty programme acquisition. You get an amazing experience when you visit one of our stylists in-store. I think it’s important that my team is on the road going out to our stores to find out how the sign-up rate is going, [how] our loyalty benefit consumers [are] coming in asking for new stuff. We can take this feedback and improve the programme. One thing to call out is that you can use the loyalty programme across the whole of Europe. If you’re in London, if you go to Paris you can go into one of our tailor shops and get [your Levi’s] tailored or hemmed. You can use your loyalty coins across the whole of Europe. It’s a pan-European programme for us.

FNW: How many tailor shops do you have in Europe and do they have a big impact on customer loyalty?

LDG: Over 70. We measure the redemption rate of our benefits. It continues to grow year on year. Tailor shop is constantly called out in our CSAT [customer satisfaction] surveys as something that they love. It relates back to the quality of the product. The other thing is that it’s about us listening to what consumers want rather than us ‘inflicting’ benefits on them!”

Boohoo Group is forging ahead with its rebrand to Debenhams Group despite losing a vote on its holding company name due to the opposition of its single biggest shareholder, Frasers Group. 

The vote affects the name change for the Jersey-based holding company and saw the shareholder meeting to vote on the proposal late last week continuing the ongoing battle between Boohoo/Debenhams and Frasers.

The basic facts are that the business for practical purposes has now rebranded itself Debenhams Group, although only getting around 62% support for the Jersey holding company to change from Boohoo Group plc to Debenhams Group plc meant that particular resolution didn’t pass. The resolution needed two-thirds approval to get through and as not all shareholders voted, Frasers’ roughly 29% stake actually accounted for around 38% of the votes cast. 

Yet Debenhams is what it will be known as to everyone but its shareholders and even with that situation, its ticker symbol for trading on the stock exchange is changing from BOO to DEBS.

Boohoo/Debenhams said in a stock exchange release: “It is no surprise to the board that Frasers, a major competitor of the group, has voted against the resolution, and continues to act in its own self-interest. Whilst the resolution was not passed, we continue forward as Debenhams Group.”

The rebrand was announced earlier this month and comes as Boohoo drives through major change. As well as relaunching its PrettyLittleThing business with a more upmarket profile, it’s tapping into the turnaround success of the Debenhams business that it acquired out of administration.

Debenhams is the fastest-growing part of Boohoo, is the careful steward of other acquired brands such as Oasis, Warehouse and Coast and is making the most of a marketplace model that the rest of the business wants to adopt.

But Mike Ashley, the majority owner of Frasers Group, is clearly not happy. And that’s perhaps unsurprising. He’d built up a stake of almost 30% in Debenhams when it was stock exchange-listed last decade, spending around £150 million. But he was forced to look on as the once-dominant department stores company rebuffed his efforts to get involved and ultimately failed. 

He also didn’t bid for the under-administration company, saying the data provided about the business was “woefully inadequate” and that his firm couldn’t bid on such vague information. Boohoo eventually won the prize for £55 million, much less than Ashley had spent on his stake.

He’s since built up that chunky shareholding in Boohoo itself but in recent periods Frasers has failed in attempts to oust Boohoo’s co-founder Mahmud Kamani from the board and to get Ashley onto the board.

Frasers hasn’t yet commented on the name change situation but one thing seems clear — the battle isn’t over yet.

Primark was rocked on Monday as owner Associated British Foods said that the boss of the Anglo-Irish budget fashion, beauty and homewares retailer, Paul Marchant, has quit with immediate effect. This comes after an allegation made about his behaviour towards an individual in a social environment.

It’s a big deal for both Primark and ABF with the retail chain contributing about half of the profits for its parent company and that strength seemingly set to expand as it rolls out more stores across Europe and the US.

The group, which is to release its next set of results — for the first half — late next month, said Eoin Tonge, ABF finance director, will act as Primark CEO on an interim basis. And Joana Edwards, ABF group financial controller, will step into his finance role for now. 

The company stressed that “both executives have the experience to perform these roles well”. Tonge has been at ABF since January 2023 and before that was at M&S, for almost three years, joining at CFO and becoming group CFO/chief strategy officer.

ABF had earlier launched an investigation that was carried out by external lawyers, into an allegation made by the unnamed individual about his behaviour towards her. Marchant “cooperated with the investigation, acknowledged his error of judgement and accepts that his actions fell below the standards expected by ABF. He has made an apology to the individual concerned, the ABF board and also to his Primark colleagues and others connected to the business”.

ABF CEO George Weston said: “I am immensely disappointed… we believe that high standards of integrity are essential. Acting responsibly is the only way to build and manage a business over the long term. Colleagues and others must be treated with respect and dignity. Our culture has to be, and is, bigger than any one individual.”

It’s a major disaster for Marchant himself who’s led Primark for over a decade and seen it go from strength to strength, despite the interruption to its business during the pandemic. 

Before jointing the company in 2009, he was COO of New Look for three years and prior to that spent eight years as trading director of Debenhams so is clearly a fixture in the UK fashion industry.