Descente Mountain Americas in a letter to dealers indicated it will not take orders for 2020/21, and Descente Ltd will be pursuing a distributor format for the future in North America.
The full letter follows:
November 12, 2019
To our valued Descente mountain product retailers in North America:
Descente Mountain Americas will not be taking orders for the 2020/21 season. We regret this may have caused confusion, and truly appreciate the support you have shown for the Descente brand. We wish to reassure you all that Descente Limited continues to view the North American winter market as a vital part of our global skiwear business. We have already determined that a new business model is necessary to ensure the continued success and future growth of the brand in the United States and Canada.
We have decided to pursue a distributor format for the future. We believe we need adequate time to identify the right partner to take our skiwear business forward, and to make the transition as seamless as possible. We will be doing that over the next few months so that our new distributor partner can begin taking orders from the 2021/22 season.
We want to assure you that for this current 2019/20 season, your DMA rep will be your point of contact regarding your current season orders, while DMA’s customer service will be fully operational and available to you for any queries related to your Descente in-store product. There will be no change in our response to all of your needs and enquiries.
For the interim transition period we are prioritizing an active response structure for your ongoing communication needs.
We wish to assure you that, after more than 30 years in this dynamic and vital market, we are absolutely as committed as ever to being here and marketing our brand to meet the needs of our loyal North American customers.
In the meantime, should you have any queries about our North American business transition, please do not hesitate to contact ski@descente.com.
Descente Business Management
