Biatta builds brand awareness amid the major players in world of lingerie.

THE creative team for Biatta lingerie insists they weren't trying to be that risque in an ad campaign showing a raven-haired model in bra and panties seductively leaning against a maroon sofa that a Great Dane is sitting on.

The model in the ads, Gabriella Hurst, is supposed to epitomize Biatta's target customer: a 25- to 40-year-old woman who wants luxury goods like Cosabella, but would rather get them at affordable prices. She's serious (hence, she's black haired, not blonde) and she's classy. The maroon sofa provides a regal background.

"I picture her as someone who is working, kind of independent and doesn't like that overtly cheesy sex appeal," said Jaymi Zentner, vice president of design for Los Angeles-based lingerie company Secret Fashion Inc., which developed the Biatta brand.

The sex quotient may be a matter of debate. But what's not in dispute is the need for a label like Biatta to raise the brand's profile at a time when just a few companies are dominating the lingerie industry.

"If you ask somebody now if they had heard of Biatta, they will ask you, 'What is Biatta?'" said Secret Fashion's director of marketing, Amy Berliner. "What we are trying to do is create awareness of the brand."

To do so, $150,000 has been shelled out to put billboards and bus posters up in Los Angeles and New York. That's small change for a megaton lingerie company like Victoria's Secret, but for a company that only does $20 million in annual sales, it's a big deal. And it's a shift in direction for Secret Fashion, which up to now has relied mostly on its designs and low prices alone to attract customers.

Racy yet sophisticated

The campaign comes just as retail consolidation has pressed Secret Fashion into making major changes. As a result of Federated Department Stores Inc.'s takeover of May Department Stores Co., Biatta will have its merchandise in twice as many stores--most of them Macy's. But Biatta is still a hit player in a $30 billion lingerie market, where huge apparel corporations rule.

Players at the top include Sara Lee Corp., VF Corp., Warnaco Group Inc., Maidenform Inc., Jockey International Inc., Fruit of the Loom, a division of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., Limited Brands Inc., and Triumph International Inc. Among smaller players, there's Los Angeles-based Paradise Lingerie Inc., known for its Honeydew Intimates brand, and New York-based International Intimates Inc.'s Rene Rofe Lingerie.

With fierce competition for floor space, Secret Fashion wants to establish itself with a racy yet sophisticated look while at the same time maintaining a price point that's affordable for mass market retailers.

"Folks are desperate to have people actively looking for brands that they sell," said Robert Passikoff, president of New York-based consultancy Brand Keys Inc. "They are looking for a certain edge. They can do that where a more established firm like a Maidenform has a harder time."

The sultry imagery puts Biatta in the category of more expensive brands, and that could be a way of eventually enticing the luxury lingerie customers. They make up only 6 percent to 16 percent of all lingerie shoppers, but they spend, on average, more than three times that of the price-sensitive shopper.

"More and more companies are trying to chase the luxury consumer because that is where all the profit dollars are," said Britt Beemer, chairman of America's Research Group. "The luxury lingerie shopper is very, very, very appearance driven."

Eventually, Secret Fashion would like to open stand-alone Biatta stores. For now, the company is relying on department stores--and doing it quite successfully.

Alison Cheldelin, a lingerie buyer for Macy's, said Biatta items are among the best sellers, even with the competition. "It has been doing really well in an area that is not trending very well," she said. "That company is very meticulous about their fit and their quality."

One key: giving the products a coherent color scheme so they can be placed together in stores. "You could be doing a lime green and a pastel that you wouldn't want to buy together, but everything there matches," she said. "They are now getting a repeat customer."

Another plus, said Cheldelin, is design creativity that has included the thonga, which is a cross between a thong and a tanga. (A tanga has thin hip straps, but is wider than a thong between the legs.) "They are out there by themselves," said Cheldelin. "There are other people trying to emulate them that are a lot smaller than they are."

Early dowdiness 

Secret Fashion started out 13 years ago making private label intimate apparel. The private label business still makes up two-thirds of the company's sales at stores that include J.C. Penney Co. Inc. and Mervyn's LLC. Biatta was started two years later when retailers demanded a higher-end, fashionable product from the company. (The company's founder, Mark Peniasian, came up with the name because he thought it sounded Italian, although it has no meaning.)

Biatta's early products came in basic colors--black, white, pink and nude--and they were high cut. "When I first came here, the line looked a bit dowdy. Everything was up to the belly button," said Zentner, who has been designing at Secret Fashion for nine years.

Since then, the company has been pushing vibrant colors, different fabrics and lacey trims. Sometimes, they've gone too far--Zentner once designed undergarments with newsprint on them. Rather than buying the product, shoppers just read the merchandise. "I thought it was really cool, but I guess it backfired. We got returns," she said.

These days, Cheldelin said some Macy's salespeople have reported customers talking about the new ads, and they seem to know more about the brand. And Berliner said there have been fewer markdowns on Biatta merchandise.

"People expect something from your brand," said Zentner. "You can't just throw anything against the wall and see if it sticks."