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  Reef co-founder Fernando Aguerre in his offices in La Jolla.

As ASR gets underway today I thought it would be good to step back and talk about the challenges facing the industry.

I asked Fernando Aguerre this question when I interviewed him, and here is an audio clip of his answer.

For those who don’t know Fernando, he and his brother, Santiago, founded the Reef sandal company in 1985. It grew to well over $50 million in revenue (that’s an estimate. Fernando would not disclose numbers) and the brothers sold 80 percent of Reef to financial investors in 2002.

VF Corp. bought Reef for $188 million in cash in 2005, according to VF’s company filings. The Aguerres sold their remaining 20 percent at that time.