Printing a new story at Woolerina

AFTER 40 years in the wool industry, Warwick Rolfe knows what quality looks like. He's been less certain about how to grow his small Australian-made wool clothing business.

Last month, a part of that puzzle fell into place when his Forbes, NSW, business Woolerina teamed up with Sydney design house Signature Prints.

The agreement places Woolerina in the middle of a supply chain that tells a compelling story from end to end.

It starts with Glenwood Merinos at Wellington, NSW, where the Smith family emphasise ethical production alongside wool quality. Mr Rolfe produces technically fine clothing from the Smiths' wool. And Signature Prints adds design chic along with a powerful story of its own (see part 3 in this series, tomorrow).

After travelling Australia and the world as a wool buyer, in 1980 Mr Rolfe moved to Forbes, NSW, with the aim of shaking up the wool selling model. And he did.

At the time, wool brokers were charging $20-$25 a bale to handle growers’ wool bales through the auction houses.

Mr Rolfe reasoned that with the new objective measurement of the fibre, buyers would only need a sample of wool to handle and assess, not entire bales. Bales could be shipped from near their point of production to the customer, without have to go through the auction rooms.

The concept proved correct: Jemalong Wool, the company Mr Rolfe established at Forbes, got handling costs down to $11 a bale, and at one point was handling nearly 10 per cent of the NSW clip. Most wool in NSW is now sold along similar lines.

Mr Rolfe sold out of Jemalong in 1997. He went farming for a couple of years, and traded maize internationally for about five years. But wool called him back.

In 2004, he began investigating what it would take to build a business that took wool from the farm to the consumer. In 2006, Woolerina launched with four clothing items, two for men and two for women.

The manufacturing facility was, and is, a small building just outside Forbes, with a handful of sewing machines. Much of the Woolerina supply chain can be found here, from yarns to big bolts of fine woollen cloth.

After considering, and rejecting, the outdoor wear market - it was already overcrowded in the mid-2000s - Mr Rolfe decided to aim for the middle.

“I didn’t want to get into the fashion sector: I wanted to put wool on everybody’s backs at a reasonable price. I think there’s an opportunity to bring wool products back to the everyday wardrobe, whether that’s a tee shirt, or a singlet or a pair of socks.”

“We know the product is right, and the fibre is right. We just need to get it on people’s backs.”

It’s an affair that began "the moment I walked into the old wool stores in Sydney" four decades ago.

He is less enthusiastic about clothing design.

"I have the final decision on whether we print, or whether we go with the blue or the green, and whether the dress should be two inches above the knee or three inches below … but I’m a mere male! I have no idea."

Although Woolerina’s alliance with Signature Prints is still in the R and D stage, Mr Rolfe has already seen the benefits of boosting the design element. Printed clothing is energising a brand that Mr Rolfe acknowledges was running low on marketing ideas.

"It’s refreshing, and it’s certainly creating a lot of interest," Mr Rolfe said. "When we hang printed childrens leggings or a sleeping bag at a market, people are really interested. They like to see us moving away from the plain colours."

Woolerina and Signature Prints were brought together by trade specialist Ian Smith, a former Austrade commissioner in the United States. Mr Rolfe's introduction to Glenwood Merinos also came through Mr Smith - unsurprisingly, because Mr Smith grew up on "Glenwood", run by his brother Norm and wife Pip.

"Ian’s introduction to Signature Prints pushed us to not only look at printing, but to look at other fabrics," Mr Rolfe said. "It’s been exciting."

The gold standard of innovative paddock-to-consumer wool business models has long been New Zealand's Icebreaker, but Mr Rolfe wonders whether this sort of alliance, in which three businesses collaborate while focusing on their own points of excellence, might not be just as effective.

Another business might have sought venture capital or a partnership. Australian Wool Innovation has offered assistance.

But Mr Rolfe said past experience, his personality, and his perfectionist standards make business collaboration more stressful than underfunded independence.

The only alternative is to grow the business from the inside out.

“I don’t want to be an Icebreaker, but I’d like to treble the size of our business at least, so that we are handling, say, 30,000 pieces a year,” Mr Rolfe said.

“If we could get to that stage, and I could employ some local people, my daughters could run the day-to-day operations and I could just look after the wool side.”

At the moment, the business doesn’t operate on enough margin for expansion. Signature Prints could change the equation, not just by boosting Woolerina sales domestically, but by channeling it to some of the design house’s 27 export destinations.

That would make a huge difference to Woolerina’s current marketing model. About a third of its product is sold online, and the remainder distributed through Australian small retailers or face-to-face at farmers markets.

Mr Rolfe’s hope is to kindle his own love of wool in young people, the latest of the two to three generations he believes have forgotten about the fibre.

“With technology and the ability to measure and know exactly what we’re using, we can make fabrics that will be very appealing to younger people.”

“Retro” is in. The throwaway mentality is out. Somewhere in that shifting consumer dynamic, Mr Rolfe thinks, wool can again claim an enduring place.

Tomorrow: The Signature Prints story

READ THE WHOLE SERIES HERE:

GALLERY: Click on the image for more photos from Woolerina

VIDEO: Warwick Rolfe tells the Woolerina story.