Roots Canada
Cem Topay
BBM4M
June 21, 2024
Executive Summary
Founded by Michael Budman and Don Green in Toronto, Canada in 1973, Roots is a Canadian
clothing brand providing comfort and style inspired by the wilderness of Algonquin Provincial
Park. By drawing inspiration from the world around them, they launched their first product: the
Roots “Negative Heel” shoe, designed to improve posture while providing comfort with a heel
lower than the toe. Introduced on August 15 of 1973, the product sold out within a month, and
opened the gates to the Roots product we all know and love today. (Roots Corporation, 2024)
“Roots's revenue for fiscal years ending February 2020 to 2024 averaged 275.8 million.”
(Finbox, 2024) with the most successful fiscal year being in January of 2020 at 329.9 million.
With the image being well known all across Canada, and the simplicity and comfort it provides,
Roots would be a perfect fit for the Japanese market.
Japan is known as the fashion capital of the world, with many fashion trends coming out of the
country and spreading across the globe. They were ahead of their time with wearing oversized
outfits, which the rest of the world caught up with a few years after them. Opening a store in
Tokyo, Japan, would be a very fruitful investment, as not only would it provide Japanese citizens
direct access to Roots clothes, but it would also help grow the business and potentially impact
the brand image in a positive way. Opening a store in Tokyo would be very on-brand, as it would
bring nature to the people of the city the same way it did in Canada, and it would suit the Tokyo
fashion scene, and create potential for growth across the rest of Japan.
Company and Product Information
Name: Roots Canada
Founder: Michael Budman and Don Green
Owner / CEO: Meghan Roach
Address: 1400 Castlefield Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, M6B4C4 (Roots, 2024)
Locations: Canada and USA
Number of Employees: 1,001 – 5,000 (LinkedIn, 2024)
Product Lines: apparel, leather bags, small leather goods, footwear, athletic wear, and home
furnishings (Roots, 2024)
Export Experience: Roots currently has 100 corporate stores in Canada, two stores in the
United States, and an eCommerce platform that ships to more than 60 countries worldwide.
There are partner-operated stores in Asia that are not corporate, especially in Taiwan. (Roots,
2024)
Is This a Domestically Successful Store?:
Yes, it is, with over 100 corporate owned stores within Canada, and bringing in averaged
revenue of 275.8 million in fiscal years ending February 2020 to 2024. (Roots, 2024) (Finbox,
2024) On 25 October 2017, Roots made an initial public offering (IPO) — it’s first sale of stock
— on the Toronto Stock Exchange, trading under the symbol ROOT (Cheung & Leung, The
Canadian Encyclopedia: Roots Canada, 2023)
Description of Product: “Effortless Style, Everyday” – Roots provides clothing inspired by
Canada’s great outdoors, along with its athletic heritage. (Roots, 2024) This vision applies to all
product lines mentioned previously.
Major Competitors: Some competitors to Roots that provide similar selection of products are
Aritzia, OVO, and Arc'teryx. Out of the three, Arc’teryx and OVO have stores in Japan.
(Arcteryx, 2024)(OVO, 2024)
Consumer Profile of Target Market:

Demographics
o Age: The ideal target market for Roots clothing would include teenagers up to
adults, who are influenced by pop culture, social media, and overall fashion
trends. It would also age groups who are more likely to do outdoor activities, or
are looking to dress comfortably. This age group would include ages 15 to 45,
although Roots has clothing for all ages.
o Gender: Roots provides clothing that is gender neutral, and inclusive of all
genders, sizes, and ages.
o Income Level: The main target in terms of income level would be middle class, as
Roots has fairly-priced clothing the lasts long due to its quality and wearability.
However, Roots does have expensive leather and varsity lines that could cater to
higher-income families. Canadian income distribution chart provided below
provides info on the home-country economic info of families:
o Family Life Cycle: Although Roots clothing applies to all 5 stages of the Family
Life Cycle, the main focus would be those who are in the Independence /
Bachelor stage, which get effected by fashion trends and social media the most.
They would be coming into purchase through motivation of keeping up with
fashion trends, or the want of trendsetting. Aside from these, people in all stages
of life could purchase Roots goods, as they apply to all age groups due to its long
lasting quality and comfort.

Psychographics
o Personality: Those who are in the market for simple and comfortable yet
fashionable clothing. The long lasting comfortable quality, paired with the
simplistic yet attractive design will attract anyone following current fashion
trends, or want to add articles to their closets that match all other pieces of
clothing.
o Lifestyle: Those who are well off, and are able to spend slightly extra for higher
quality and comfort, while not compromising on the fashion side.

Beliefs and Values: Believes in quality over quantity, and values said
quality in clothing, accessories, leather goods, etc.


Motivations: Fashion trends, comforts, outdoors, simplicity
Marketing Strategy Currently Used: Both centralized and decentralized marketing
strategies can be seen with Roots, as they have corporate owned stores within US and
Canada, but also partner-operated ones within Asia that can follow decentralized
marketing strategies as they would be operating under their own terms.

Marketing Mix for Product Selected:
o Product: Roots has apparel, leather bags, small leather goods, footwear, athletic
wear, and home furnishings. Their main three lines are Salt and Pepper Knitwear,
Roots Leather, and Varsity Jackets.
o Price: From as low as $5 CAD, to over $1,000 CAD (Roots, 2024)
o Place: 100 corporate stores in Canada, 2 stores in the United States, over 100
partner-operated stores in Asia, mainly Taiwan.
o Promotion: Leaning towards the family and nature oriented image, Roots tends to
market through social media, word of mouth, and simply its storefront windows.
Roots has also had largely effective marketing campaigns through using celebrity
power to market its products, and also when they outfitted Canadian athletes for
the 1998 Nagano Olympic Winter Games. (Cheung & Leung, The Canadian
Encyclopedia: Roots Canada, 2023)
Demographic and Economic Profile of Export Destination: Japan
Demographic Information:

Population Comparison (2023):
o Japan: 123.3 Million (WorldOMeter, 2024)
o Canada: 38.8 Million (WorldOMeter, 2024)

Population Growth Yearly (2023):
o Japan: -0.53% (WorldOMeter, 2024)
o Canada: +0.85% (WorldOMeter, 2024)

Age Distribution:

Rural vs Urban (WorldOMeter, 2024)

Literacy Rates (Index Mundi, via CIA World Factbook, 2015)
o Total population: 99%
o Male: 99%
o Female: 99% (2002)

Ethnic Groups: (Index Mundi, via CIA World Factbook, 2021)
o Japanese 97.9%
o Chinese 0.6%
o Korean 0.4%
o Other 1.1% (includes Vietnamese, Filipino, and Brazilian) (2017 est.)

Religious Groups: (Index Mundi, via CIA World Factbook, 2021)
o Shintoism 69%
o Buddhism 66.7%
o Christianity 1.5%
o Other 6.2% (2018 est.)

Languages Spoken: (Original Travel, 2024)
o 99.2% of people in Japan have Japanese as their first language.
o Korean is spoken by 0.5% Population and Chinese about 0.2%.
o English is spoken in major cities, but is not a given.
Economic Information:

GDP Per Capita (World Bank, 2024)
o Japan: $34,017.30 USD
o Canada: $55,522.40 USD

Unemployment Rate (Trading Economics, 2024):
o As of April of 2024, Japan’s unemployment rate is %2.6, which is 1.83 million
people.

Currency Name and Current Exchange Rate to Canadian Dollar:
o Currency Name: Japanese Yen
o Exchange Rate: 1 CAD = 116.643 JPY (XE, 2024)

Currency stability (5 year graph - compared to USD) (XE, 2024)

Income Distribution Chart:
o Japan, 32.9, 2013 (World Population Review, 2024)(World Bank, 2024)

Top 3 Export Partners, 2022 (OEC, 2024)
o United States, $137B
o China, $135B
o South Korea, $50.8B

Top 3 Import Partners, 2022 (OEC, 2024)
o China, $178B
o Australia, $80.1B
o USA, $79.5B
Political Profile