WESC

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WeSC (WE are the Superlative Conspiracy), or WE as it's casually known, is a Swedish clothing brand, focusing mainly on Roller skating/street style clothing. Founded in 1999, it has quickly become one of Sweden's most popular brands, within Sweden as well as internationally. WESC has their own stores in among other places Tokyo, Beverly Hills, München and New York, as well as being sold in a large number of other cities [1].

50% of the shares of WESC are owned by the founders (among them the president Greger Hagelin), and another 20% is owned by Swedish industry tycoon Antonia Ax:son Johnson's investment group Novax.

The brand first became famous through sponsoring many Swedish underground artists and musicians with connections to the skating world with clothes, and little to no other marketing. Among the first to sport WESC clothes were Swedish hip hop acts Looptroop and Timbuktu. This helped WESC to gain an underground, "alternative" image which turned out to be very popular with many young Swedish consumers, critical of other companies and their perceived "greediness". WESC is still sponsoring many famous personalities with clothing, which they refer to as "activists" or "weactivists", among them Jason Lee, Peter Stormare, Chad Robertson, Jerry Hsu, Millencolin and Mikael Persbrandt.

This strategy has also made WESC come under fire because of their constructed "underdog" image, when they in fact are one of Sweden's biggest clothing companies. Their main office in Stockholm is situated between Gucci and Cerutti on Birger Jarlsgatan, one of the posher streets of the city. Some of their former "activists" have also spoken out how they regret promoting the brand, for example the hip-hop crew Looptroop. Emcee Promoe told the Swedish music magazine "la musik" it came to a point where he felt "it was too much" and thought "What have I done?" [2].

WESC is working hard on increasing their sales in the USA, as they reportedly feel the market in Sweden is already saturated, and in order to keep their underground image, they wouldn't want to be bigger there than they already are. [3]