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Oxford-based Jennifer Brown launched the Pampeano business in 2008 after a sabbatical in Argentina, despite having no retail experience or external investment. She was so inspired by the country’s leather-making heritage that she returned to the UK determined to build a brand centred around craftsmanship and products designed to last. Eighteen years later, Pampeano generates annual revenues of £3.5 million and grew by a whopping 70% last year.
The business is currently seeing strong momentum in the US, and in 2025 wholesale sales increased by 36% year-on-year, while online sales grew by 41% – leading to a launch with Nordstrom in May and the opening of a fulfilment facility in Miami. In the UK, the brand is sold by the likes of Harrods and John Lewis, among others.
Rather than continually reinventing the range, Brown has focused on refining Pampeano’s core products. The brand is best known for its signature handwoven leather belts. Each belt is handcrafted by master artisans in Argentina using vegetable-tanned leather, with each one taking around five hours to make. The brand also offers a complimentary repair service, with customers regularly returning products purchased more than a decade ago to be repaired and worn again and again.
Brown has navigated everything from early product mistakes and cash flow pressures to Brexit-related currency challenges and international expansion, while raising two daughters as a single mother. She tells all about how she got where she has.
What did you do prior to launching Pampeano in 2008 and how did it come about?
Before launching Pampeano in 2008, my career looked very different. I studied physics at Edinburgh and then went into investment banking. I went on to complete a Master’s in European Real Estate, applying Modern Portfolio Theory to commercial property investment. That led me to work for Grosvenor, where a key bit of work I did was building investment models for property funds and qualifying as a surveyor.
Still a bit unsure what I wanted to do, I took a sabbatical to Argentina in my late twenties. I was captivated by the country’s incredible leather-working heritage. Everywhere I looked, there was an extraordinary level of craftsmanship, aligned with simple beauty and natural materials that weren’t readily available at home. Some friends came out to Argentina to play polo, and we discussed my nascent ideas. They were the ones who encouraged me to go for it.
I began working with local artisans to create beautifully handcrafted leather accessories, designing simple leather goods that appealed to me. My first designs were travel bags, which were my first ‘mistake’! I hadn’t thought through that consumers wouldn’t spend a large dollop of money on a brand that they didn’t know. So, most of my initial investment went on stock that got immediately stuck. It was my smaller leather goods that sold first, and belts were the key. I didn’t really think too deeply about things; I leapt from idea to task with a smattering of hope and messing about in Excel. What started as an impetuous decision to go for it quickly became something much bigger, and in 2008 I founded Pampeano, which is named after La Pampa – the region in Argentina where the brand was born.
What happened next?
In 2009 I became a mum and two years later had another daughter and then became a single parent! Money was tight for a very long time, so everything went back into the business. I have two strong-willed and fabulous girls who have this summer been stuffing (now hugely popular) travel bags in our UK warehouse for their summer job. Looking back, my earlier career gave me the commercial and analytical foundations to build a business, but it was Argentina that gave me the inspiration and purpose. Bringing those two worlds together is what made Pampeano possible.
How have you grown the business over the years?
When I founded Pampeano, the business was centred around a simple idea: bringing the exceptional product quality and artisanal craftsmanship of South America to Europe. Over the past 18 years, I have grown that vision into a global lifestyle brand while staying true to the values that inspired me from the very beginning.
Today, Pampeano ships to customers globally. For a long time, Pampeano was not only leather goods, as we also sold polo equipment and were the only wholesaler in the UK for it. I eventually realised that polo equipment wasn’t an efficient use of capital. By a stroke of luck, we sold down our holdings in late 2019, months before Covid struck. We were exceptionally lucky to start that immensely tough time with a lot less stock and with a bit more cash than usual.
Unlike some of the huge high street retailers, we stood by all our suppliers and stuck to our production commitments, which proved serendipitous. In February 2020, we started Facebook advertising, and a month later everyone was scrolling through lockdown. Our online business exploded and we had the stock still coming through to meet demand.
How did Pampeano evolve?
The brand has evolved from being known as a muddle of polo equipment and leather goods to one of clarity. We are known for our signature belts and an extensive collection of premium leather goods, from travel bags and wallets to keyrings.
One of our biggest areas of growth has been our bespoke offering. Very early on, we started creating custom membership belts for reputed clubs, organisations and businesses worldwide, incorporating their own colours and insignia. That side of the business has become a major driver of Pampeano’s success. We now work with around 100 prestigious organisations and institutions, including prestigious schools and alumni associations such as Stowe, Rugby, St Edwards, the Old Etonian Association, over 45 regiments, including the Royal Household Division, Gurkhas and Guards, and sports clubs such as Henley Royal Regatta, RAC and Neilson Racing.
Internationally, we have continued to build on that success through exclusive membership products for organisations such as Goldman Sachs in New York, Holderness & Bourne, and the Santa Barbara and Harvard Polo Clubs in the United States. These partnerships have enabled us to introduce Pampeano to new audiences while reinforcing the premium positioning of the brand.
How do you sustain that growth?
As the business has grown, we have invested in the infrastructure to support it. We moved into progressively larger offices and warehouses over the years before relocating to our current headquarters in North Oxford in 2020. We took a second unit in 2024 and have outgrown both. We have continued to innovate. Responding to the growing interest of consumers looking for personalised experiences, we launched a ‘Design-your-Own’ (DYO) tool in 2020 on our website to allow customers to bring their own designs to life.
The DYO tool was first tested on just belts, to let customers create their personalised belts by choosing from a series of patterns, 48 thread colours, four leather options and four buckle options. Later, following the success of the DYO belt tool, that service was extended to the dog accessories segment. It has been rewarding to see customers create matching designs for themselves and their dogs, and it has reinforced our belief that personalisation is an important part of Pampeano’s brand experience.
Additionally, gifting has become one of our strongest commercial drivers, accounting for approximately 40% of direct-to-consumer (DTC) revenue over the past 12 months. The combination of meaningful personalisation, premium packaging and timeless craftsmanship make Pampeano products particularly well suited to milestone occasions and premium gifting.
What are the retail price points?
Our retail prices range from approximately £25 for smaller leather accessories to £475 for our premium leather travel bags. Our core Pampeano belts typically retail at £85, with more detailed embroidered styles priced at around £99. This places Pampeano within the “accessible luxury” category. High enough to reflect the quality of the materials, skilled craftsmanship and uncompromising customer service, while remaining attainable for gifting and everyday use.
What retailers do you supply?
Another exciting milestone has been expanding our retail presence through internationally recognised department stores. In 2016, we started working with John Lewis; in 2022, Harrods; in 2023, Follestad in Norway; in 2024, Care of Carl in Sweden; and in 2025, El Corte Ingles in Spain. We also work with Joules and Just for Pets. This year, we opened a third-party logistics (3PL) solution centre in Miami to better serve our US customers. We also started working with Nordstrom. As of June 2026, Pampeano is stocked by 392 retailers across 37 countries, giving us a substantial global retail footprint and creating sustainable growth across multiple markets.
Beyond products and retail, I have always wanted Pampeano to represent a lifestyle rather than simply a collection of accessories. That’s why we’ve invested in partnerships with brands and events that reflect our values and have some fantastic collaborations in the pipeline.
What have you enjoyed most about your journey with Pampeano?
Perhaps the most rewarding part of the journey has been the loyalty of our customers and partners. I still hear from people who bought one of our belts more than a decade ago and tell me it has become even more beautiful with age and is still their favourite belt. Many of our retail partners have been with us since the very beginning, and those long-standing relationships have been instrumental in our growth.
While Pampeano has grown significantly over the past 18 years, much has remained constant: authentic craftsmanship, timeless design, our commitment to plastic-free packaging, as well as the skilled artisans who handcraft every product.
What are your best-selling products?
Our signature leather Pampeano belts remain our best-selling products by a significant margin and really are the heart of the brand. Although a wide range of Pampeano products are unisex, we are still largely a men’s accessory brand. Between March 2025 and February 2026, our belts represented two-thirds of all business revenue. A hugely growing category is the Pampeano travel bag collection, which now represents around 15% of all sales.
How is your business balanced between direct-to-consumer and wholesale?
Direct-to-consumer remains a key part of the business, allowing us to build strong relationships with our customers and showcase the full Pampeano brand experience through our own website. It represented a third of our business last year, with the remainder being wholesale – which continues to grow apace and is an important driver of our international expansion as it helps to bring the brand to new audiences and strengthen our presence in key international markets.
What is your strongest market and where are you currently growing the fastest?
Our strongest market has always been our home market; however, now it represents only around 40% of total revenue. The next biggest market is Scandinavia (particularly Norway), followed by Germany and the US market. While our belts remain our hero product, with over £1m in sales to the Scandinavian market alone, the travel bags – with Pampeano’s colourful, hand-woven belt designs replicated in the straps – grew almost tenfold in 2025 versus 2024.
What’s Pampeano’s real USP?
Every Pampeano product begins with traditional craftsmanship that has been passed down through generations. The leather is vegetable-tanned using natural tannins in a slower process than conventional chrome tanning, creating leather that is soft, durable and develops a beautiful patina with age. Skilled artisans then spend hours handweaving and hand-stitching each signature ‘pampa’ diamond, ensuring every piece reflects the care and attention that goes into its making. Rather than prioritising production volume, we choose to invest in time, skill and quality.
What plans do you have for the brand going forward?
Later this year, we are planning to launch a new bag collection that will introduce new materials and colourways to our leather goods range. We will also be launching a limited-edition belt with a very popular UK-based male influencer who fits our younger target demographic.
Additionally, we are also doing a brand partnership with a premium country clothing brand in the UK that we plan to release in September. On the wholesale private-label side, we are designing bespoke bags for Goldman Sachs in the US, which will bring Pampeano’s craftsmanship to the highly relevant affluent consumers in the market.
We are also targeting the addition of around 50 new wholesale partners during 2027, supported by our presence at leading international trade shows including Pitti Uomo in Florence, IWA in Nuremberg and NY NOW in the United States.
Does social media play a key part in getting your brand ‘out there’?
Yes, social media is a growing part of our marketing strategy, helping us both increase brand awareness and drive customer acquisition. We use both organic and paid marketing on Meta, which has increased our reach by 74% between 15 April and 13 July. Our primary channels are Instagram, Facebook and TikTok, where we continue to build an engaged community around the brand. We currently have 25k followers on Instagram, 17k on Facebook, and 7k on TikTok.
Are influencers and brand ambassadors also important to Pampeano?
Influencer marketing has become an increasingly important part of our growth strategy, particularly as we expand internationally. We’re focused on building long-term relationships with creators whose personal style and values genuinely align with the Pampeano brand, rather than simply pursuing reach.
Our collaborations are currently centred on the UK, US and key European markets, where we’ve worked with a range of respected figures in menswear, lifestyle and sport. These include American menswear creator Parker York Smith (1 million followers), UK style creator Kornelijus Budrys, British actor Jules Knight, Italian menswear influencer Mauro Littera, and Norwegian Olympic freestyle skiing gold medallist Birk Ruud. These partnerships build significant brand credibility for us.
In July 2026, we joined AWIN, a popular affiliate marketing platform, marking an important step in expanding our influencer marketing efforts. The affiliate partnership will allow us to build a scalable network of trusted influencers and content creators across our key markets, helping us reach more affluent, style-conscious men aged 25-55.
Do you find customers keep coming back for more?
Absolutely. Customer loyalty has always been one of the strongest indicators that we are doing something right. Many of our customers first discover Pampeano through one of our signature belts, but they often return to purchase additional belt designs, wallets, travel bags, pet accessories or personalised gifts. We have also seen repeat purchases continue to grow, with returning customers increasing from 18% to 24% (in online sales) over the past year. I think that’s a reflection of the quality of the products, the level of customer service we provide, and the emotional connection people develop with the brand.