Veneto-based Asak&Co to distribute American brand Vionic in Italy

Asak&Co, a Bussolengo-based company founded in 1992 by sisters Barbara and Sonia Dalla Rosa, has been awarded the distribution on the Italian market for the men’s and women’s footwear brand Vionic, owned by Caleres, a $3-billion U.S. group that acquired Stuart Weitzman from Tapestry last February.

“Our company was established to distribute the Clarks brand in Italy, with which we collaborated for 33 years until the beginning of this year, when the brand’s new ownership (Hong Kong fund LionRock Capital, which acquired Clarks in 2021, ed.) reorganized the distribution,” Barbara Dalla Rosa, at Micam 100, told FashionNetwork.com. “My sister and I could have simply closed the company and retired, but we thought about our employees and decided to roll up our sleeves and start again.”

As a first move, the two businesswomen converted 16 of the 20 single-brand stores they had opened under the Clarks banner into Camper stores through a franchise agreement. Another four, plus two outlet spaces in Barberino and Valmontone, became multibrand Asak 25 stores, named after the company and the year of the restart.

“We were later contacted by Caleres, who proposed to us the Italian distribution of Vionic, a brand founded in Australia in 1991 and then moved to California. Having arrived in Europe a few years ago, now the brand wants to position itself in our country,” Dalla Rosa continued.

“We have already conducted a test with the S/S 2025 season within our stores and in selected outlets. With the S/S 2026, the first season in full swing, we aim to reach about 250 stores, mainly footwear specialists selling products in line with Vionic’s characteristics.”

Indeed, the brand’s products are designed with unique alignment technology to balance the entire body, improving posture and balance without sacrificing aesthetics. Building on its unique know-how in the orthopedic industry, Vionic has developed Vio-Motion Technology, a patented system that optimizes the body’s natural movement and promotes daily well-being.

Each model combines biomechanical support, heel stabilization, and energy return materials, resulting in collections that merge performance and lifestyle, high-quality materials, and ergonomic design, in a perfect synthesis of scientific research and fashion sensibility.

“Vionic products are crafted with high-quality materials, almost all sourced from Italy, yet they maintain an accessible price point, about 150 euros to the public,” Dalla Rosa concluded. “They are shoes designed by orthopedists, physiatrists, and chiropractors and are registered as medical devices in both America and Europe, although with a taste and aesthetic aligned with current trends.”