Yesterday's nudes: Playboy looks to dress up its image in Asia with brand apparel
Five years before this week's announcement by Playboy that it would cease publishing nude photos, chief executive Scott Flanders talked about repositioning the brand in Asia and its potential to expand in China
Hugh Hefner's iconic Playboy bunny is gearing up for a major hop into the China market, but instead of adult media the focus will be on marketing Playboy 'with Chinese characteristics' as an apparel brand.
"In America, Playboy makes people think about sex and Playboy Bunnies," said Alex Wang Chengjin, a Wenzhou businessman whose company Glory Rabbit International Investment recently acquired the rights to manufacture and sell Playboy-branded apparel and household goods across the mainland.
"While Chinese people recognise Playboy as an international brand, they don't really understand what it is all about," Wang said. "So we have a lot of space to work with in terms of how ... we introduce the culture of the brand in China," he said.
Faced with declining publishing revenues in the United States, Playboy Enterprises is banking on non-media licensing ventures in China for future growth. A small litter of recent brand licensing deals - for China apparel with Glory Rabbit, for a pair of casino nightclubs in Macau with Sands China, and for a retail outlet in Taipei - are part of a broad repositioning of Playboy's business beyond the original men's magazine founded by Hefner in 1953.
Asia, led by the China market, accounted for a third of Playboy's licensing revenue last year and that figure is expected to exceed 40 per cent this year, Playboy Enterprises chief executive Scott Flanders said.