This may have been the summer without a unifying trend, but it was undeniably the season of the flip flop. Once confined to the beach, the silhouette took over city streets, luxury campaigns and social media feeds — and Havaianas ensured it was at the centre of the conversation.
From appointing Gigi Hadid as global ambassador in January, followed by a viral studded style in collaboration with Barcelona label Gimaguas, and most recently, a futuristic 3D-printed tie-up with Zellerfeld at Copenhagen Fashion Week, the Brazilian brand has steadily repositioned itself from mass-market staple to fashion world talking point. Indeed, Pinterest search data shows global searches for “Havaianas” spiked 51 per cent year-on-year in August, with their newly launched square-toe going from zero to 12,000 searches.
Its focus proved essential in a season where flip flops became one of fashion’s most contested items. Reimagined for a fashion context, the silhouette drew a wave of entrants into the space: luxury houses such as Alaïa and Bottega Veneta unveiled elevated thong sandals, while Crocs tapped the Y2K mood with playful platform iterations. At the top end, The Row’s £600 leather flip flop crystallised the debate around status, sparking questions about whether the humble beach shoe could ever carry true luxury value. Amid the noise, Havaianas stayed true to its democratic price point, while using high-profile collaborations to evolve the silhouette and cement its place as a credible fashion staple.
Driving that momentum is Harm van de Camp, CEO and president of Havaianas parent company Alpargatas Europe, who joined 18 months ago with a mandate to sharpen the brand’s positioning within wider EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) markets. He describes the strategy as built on three pillars: product innovation and collaborations, storytelling rooted in Brazilian heritage, and a more segmented approach to distribution. “Fifteen years ago, you couldn’t get into a club wearing trainers. Now, you can work for a bank in them. Why not flip flops?” van de Camp says on their long-term growth strategy.
Authentic roots, new horizons
Born in Brazil in the early 1960s as a mass footwear player, Havaianas became so culturally embedded that at one point, the Brazilian government regulated their price alongside rice and beans to protect consumers during hyperinflation. “Every time I tell that story I get goosebumps,” says van de Camp. “It shows how deeply connected this brand is to the people of Brazil.” That authenticity, he argues, is a differentiator in today’s market, where many brands manufacture lifestyle narratives. “We don’t have to invent one. Ours is real.”
Of course, marrying that deep local identity with global appeal is not always straightforward, especially as the style gets remixed by other aesthetic cultures. Part of the flip flop’s fashion boom was fuelled by Scandinavian influencers, who annexed the sandal into pared-back Scandi minimalism. For Havaianas, the challenge is to participate in those conversations without diluting its roots, or being written out of them. “We do a lot of social listening,” says van de Camp. “When we first talked about Copenhagen, some Brazilian consumers pushed back. So now in our communication we give credit to both: it’s Brazilian at heart, but also reimagined by the Copenhagen girls.”
That balance — staying close to a six-decade origin story while embracing cultural reinterpretations — also acts as insurance against the volatility of micro-trends. New entrants risk being crowned the ‘final boss’ of a viral moment, only to vanish the following season. Havaianas, by contrast, can lean on heritage to ensure the flip flop endures as more than just a summer 2025 obsession. “We are the OG,” van de Camp says, “and with that comes responsibility — to innovate, to collaborate and to keep showing consumers why flip flops remain relevant.”
Extending seasonality is central to this. While Havaianas has long been a staple summer brand, the next step is to embed itself in city life and year-round wardrobes. “I would say we already are a staple,” van de Camp explains. “But we are a summer staple — as much as a towel in a suitcase for a beach holiday. The challenge and opportunity we have now is to become a fashion staple. That is the overall objective of our strategy: extending the season and the usage of our product.”
The idea is to stretch the silhouette into new iterations: city-ready versions with thicker soles, heeled adaptations for the evening, and experimental designs like the Zellerfeld pair. The male consumer represents another growth area. Traditionally skewing female, Havaianas now sees untapped potential in the men’s and streetwear markets. Collaborations with brands like Butter and TwoJeys are designed to open distribution doors in streetwear channels, where authenticity is prized. “Slides have had their time,” says van de Camp. “That’s a massive opportunity for flip flops, and especially for us as the authentic brand in that space.”
Collaboration has become a key lever in straddling heritage and reinvention. By staying rooted in its Brazilian DNA, while partnering with players across fashion tiers, Havaianas has found ways to enter markets and speak to fresh consumer groups without diluting its core. The appointment of Hadid as global ambassador earlier this year signalled the brand’s intent to align with international star power, while a limited-edition drop with Barcelona label Gimaguas brought subcultural edge and viral impact, amplified by organic influencer traction from Ibiza to Kylie Jenner’s feed. A luxe tie-up with Dolce Gabbana further cemented its credibility in high fashion retail, and the headline-grabbing Zellerfeld collaboration — the world’s first 3D-printed Havaianas flip flop — underscored its ambition to lead innovation in the category.
Rethinking the marketplace
Havaianas’s biggest internal reset has come not just from products, but from how it sells them. “Traditionally, we focused distribution on the coastlines of Europe, because you think that’s where people buy flip flops,” says van de Camp. “The reality is: yes, they buy flip flops there, but the majority actually buys them where they live. That’s what we learnt from the data.”
Armed with that insight, the brand has shifted emphasis to Europe’s major cities and built what van de Camp calls a “pyramid model” of distribution: top-tier retailers for brand-building, mid-tier for broader access, and mass for volume. The key change is segmentation. “If you go to a luxury retailer and offer them a product that is also on Amazon, they won’t be interested,” he says. “So we now design assortments unique to each level of distribution. That was a fundamental change — and fundamental to our success.”
This means difficult choices. “We have massive business at the bottom of the pyramid with one of our most iconic products, the Brasil Logo,” van de Camp says. “Now, we need to divest from that, because you want to sell it at the top of the pyramid. In the past, we had one line and sold it to everybody. That has shifted since we started this journey at the beginning of 2024.”
Examples illustrate the approach. In London, Havaianas sits within Schuh, Office, Foot Locker and Selfridges — stores that are metres apart, yet serve very different customers. Paris follows the same pattern: Galeries Lafayette with a premium execution, versus youth-focused Citadium next door. In the UK, Flannels secured exclusivity for the Dolce Gabbana collaboration, while Office received a bespoke in-store system tailored to its customer base.
Alongside wholesale, the brand has redefined its own channels. “Our dot-com used to be very price-driven, very volume-driven,” he says. “Now, it’s a full-price proposition, focused on experience, education and storytelling. Premium doesn’t mean more expensive — but it shouldn’t have a grocery feel.”
Still, wholesale remains the main growth engine. “Unlike brands that say ‘DTC [direct-to-consumer] first’, we are not a 365 business; we don’t have a 12-month business. Wholesale is our engine of growth. We leverage those partners like no other, and we leverage DTC to show what a really cool, premium flip flop experience looks like,” he says.
That pyramid strategy has already brought in partners including Zara, JD, Naked Copenhagen and Galeries Lafayette. “The reassurance we’ve had this year is that the strategy works,” says van de Camp. “From Zara knocking on our door to Kylie Jenner wearing Gimaguas, the momentum is real.”
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