Company: AAi Foster Grant
Type of business: producer of sunglasses, reading glasses, and eye wear accessories. Foster Grant’s owner, Accessories Associates Inc., also sells clocks, watches, small leather goods, and jewelry.
Number of employees: 300 locally, about 2,000 worldwide
Year founded : 1919
Location: 500 George Washington Highway, Smithfield
Annual sales: Approximately $200 million
Mention the ad campaign, “Who’s that behind those Foster Grants?” to a child of the 1960s and `70s, and you’ll likely elicit the images of Woody Allen or Raquel Welch hiding behind dark sunglasses.
Rhode Island's Market Has Changed. Developers, Builders, Investors and Sellers Must Change With It.
By Emilio DiSpirito IV License Partner | Engel & Völkers Oceanside Leader | The DiSpirito…
Learn More
But do the same to someone of a later generation, the 1980s and ’90s, and you’re just as likely to inspire a blank stare.
That’s the dilemma confronting AAi Foster Grant, the Smithfield company which produces sunglasses, reading glasses, and eye wear accessories. The company became the dominant player in the $30-and-under sunglasses market from 1965 to 1984 with its “Who’s that” campaign. Peter Sellers, Elvis Presley, and Herschel Walker were among the celebrities who powered the ad campaign which established the Foster Grant brand that served the company so well.
But in 1984 the campaign ended, and brand identity tailed off.
“The support for the brand was cut back,” said Foster Grant Vice President of Marketing Bill Potts.
Today that’s changing. In a push to dominate the world sunglasses market, and to celebrate its 70th year in business, Foster Grant is bringing the old ads back, this time with model Cindy Crawford. The company is betting that Crawford will bridge generations, since she is known both for her modeling career and for her appearances on MTV.
“She’s the perfect spokesperson,” Potts said.
Hiring the right spokespeople has been part of the formula behind Foster Grant’s success. The company was formed in 1919 by two men, Sam Foster and Bill Grant, who established a women’s hair accessories business in Leominster, Mass. The business declined, however, when feminine hair styles went from long to short in the mid 1920s. The pair had to think of something else.
In 1927, they did. Sensing a desire by the public to buy sunglasses without having to have them made by an eye doctor, they developed a method of mass-producing them. In 1929, they brought their sunglasses to the Atlantic City boardwalk to see if they would sell.
Of course, they did.
After that the business took off. And when the now-famous marketing campaign – which Advertising Age magazine ranked 66th best of the century, just ahead of Perdue’s “It takes a tough man to make tender chicken” – kicked off in the mid 1960s, the company established a stronghold in the inexpensive sunglasses market.
Foster Grant has since stayed almost exclusively with that market, which Potts said accounts for 85 percent of all sunglasses sold in the United States.
“We’re the only recognized brand name at that price point,” Potts said. “A brand is really important to the consumer.”
Part of establishing a brand is smart marketing. But forming a brand that becomes synonymous with your product requires more than glossy magazine ads. It takes a steady commitment to enhancing the product, constant study of markets, trends, and the desires of consumers, and support for the product at retail locations – being sure displays are laid out attractively.
That has been the Foster Grant model for developing a brand. For example, Foster Grant sunglasses have features like rocking nose pads for comfort and unique ear rests and temple and nose bridge designs for fashion. It makes sports sunglasses that wrap snugly around the head for competitors in the Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. The company also makes a similar product for people who want the look of a tri-athlete but are more inclined to watch the event.
Sports sunglasses are a hot seller, Potts said. But the aging baby-boomer crowd is also consuming the Foster Grant line of non-prescription reading glasses – another market the company is targeting, he said.
Giving customers what they want, in comfort and in fashion, is a constant focus at Foster Grant. Trends can start anywhere in the world, and thus company representatives are constantly talking with designers and fashion editors worldwide to find out what’s hot. Like any company operating in an industry affected by trends, Foster Grant must always be aware of what is and is not selling.
“We put a lot of attention into our product,” Potts said. “We have an obligation to provide to the consumer more than they expect.”
Foster Grant is run by a Rhode Island businessman, Gerald F. Cerce, who is the chairman of Accessories Associates Inc. (AAi) of Smithfield, which distributes women’s accessories, including jewelry and watches. AAi purchased Foster Grant in December of 1996 for $29 million from BEC Group Inc. of Rye, N.Y. At the time of the purchase, Foster Grant was based in Dallas, where it had been operating since it was moved from Massachusetts in 1989.
In October of 1998, AAi moved Foster Grant to Smithfield, and added 100,000 square feet to its George Washington Highway plant to accommodate the new operation. Potts said the company produces products both domestically and in overseas factories in Asia and Africa.
Cerce has ambitious plans for Foster Grant. For example, the company will soon embark on a major study, using focus groups, to determine whether the Foster Grant brand will apply well to other kinds of accessories. Before it does, however, Cerce wants to build on his already successful sunglasses business.
One of his objectives is to expand international sales. The company already sells in Mexico, Canada, England, and Germany, but Cerce also hopes to expand sales in Europe. He also plans to test his products in Chile. If they sell there, he will expand into Argentina and the rest of Central and South America.
A big part of the push will be marketing to the MTV generation of teenagers, so that the “Who’s that” Foster Grant ads will become as familiar to them as it is to their parents.
“I’m not going to be satisfied until every person in the world knows our brand,” Cerce said, and “it’s the first name on everyone’s list when (they) talk about sunglasses.”
