How Alejandro Betancourt López Harnessed Social Media for a Big Win With Hawkers Sunglasses 

So, you’ve got amazing sunglasses to sell. How do you get people to find out about them, get excited, and buy? How do you get existing customers to keep buying?

Alejandro Betancourt López and the team at Hawkers knew that the traditional answer was “sell them in a shop,” but instead tried something innovative to get the word out: social media.

Once he became involved with the company, Betancourt brought his business know-how to the Spanish sunglasses brand and solidified initial social media efforts.

“What I say changed the world is that people are now expressing themselves through videos, applications,” Betancourt explains. “And that before five years ago, people were putting their pictures on Instagram. And before that, they were doing posts on Facebook, and everything changes. Just talking about social media at this point in so many ways, things that affect the way we behave and we interact, that we have to constantly adapt if we were looking to create an impact into the market and invest and make sure we are adding something. We need to be prepared that everything is changing constantly, and we need to adapt [to] that.”

The Alejandro Betancourt Success Effect

Now, Hawkers sells more than 10,000 pairs of sunglasses a day online to customers in more than 50 countries. It sees annual sales of more than $70 million and is considered an impressive success story, especially since 90% of its profits come from social media placement as well as relationships with influencers plus other fashion and style brands eager to collaborate.

Hawkers is a disruptor, shaking up a fixed marketplace for sunglasses, where for years, people had to choose between something cheap and low quality or something well-made but expensive.

The initial concept, combined with Betancourt’s support, gave customers worldwide a third choice: a high-quality product that looks good but is also affordable.

Hawkers have detachable lenses that allow owners to easily match their shades to their look. Top athletes, actors, models, and other celebs have worn them, fueling public interest and demand.

How Things Started

Social media, or at least “not a retail location,”  is a part of the Hawkers origin story.

A group of four Spanish students came across a style of sunglasses in the U.S. called Knockarounds that they thought Europeans would enjoy. They had detachable lenses and were neither overly expensive nor ridiculously cheap.

They purchased about $300 worth of glasses — roughly 30 pairs — exported them to Spain, and sold them on an online classified site. The first batch sold fast and led to more orders. Knockarounds noticed the attention and declared the group its official Spanish distributor.

However, they decided it would be more interesting to sell their own line, so they worked with a manufacturer to start making their own sunglasses brand, which they called Hawkers.

Although sales were steady and Hawkers was slowly gaining recognition, it was in poor shape financially, so the founders began looking for capital and support.

They found both in Alejandro Betancourt, who had a long history of helping different companies and even economic sectors thrive.

The native of Venezuela studied business and finance in the U.S. and returned to his home country. He developed an internet company and a bank, and brought nuclear power to the country, providing jobs and more energy for many homes.

With these accomplishments under his belt, he looked for other projects to get involved with. He immediately saw the potential of Hawkers and helped the company raise more than $56 million. But he also wanted to be part of the process, so he joined the leadership team.

A few years later, Alejandro Betancourt helped Hawkers find even more financing, a move that also installed him as company president and majority shareholder. He’s now directly involved in many of the decisions that get more people to know about Hawkers and how they can improve one’s personal style.

Alejandro Betancourt’s Social Efforts

The idea of using social media started when someone who wanted a new iPhone approached the company to request that, if Hawkers paid for the phone, she’d be happy to talk about the company, including lots of commentary and mentions while waiting in line to change to the new device.

This started efforts to work more closely with influencers on Facebook and Instagram. Partnerships were set up where they could talk positively about Hawkers to their followers or show off wearing these cool glasses. Bonus points were earned if they used certain hashtags that made it easy to share and have a larger reach.

The Hawkers staff contacted stylists, photographers, and personal assistants, hoping they could be included in photo shoots. The celebrity, athlete, or model was able to keep the shades at the end of the shoot rather than giving them back.

Hawkers also created limited-edition lines for certain brands or special events, another effort that increased the brand’s visibility, built demand, and attracted more attention from other social media users.

It developed a college ambassador program, where thousands of students would receive Hawkers. They would then wear them around campus and post the images on their social media pages. To compensate them for these efforts, ambassadors could get some Hawkers items for free, other discounts, as well as goodies like concert tickets.

However, one of the main social media efforts was using the power of Facebook Ads. This service allowed a much larger reach for a relatively small investment, and the ability to target likely customers was better than a general ad.

After an initial Facebook ad spend of $45 per day, Hawkers currently has more than 6.6 million followers on its official Facebook page, considered one of the largest for a sunglasses brand.

Hawkers’ success piqued Facebook’s interest, and the social media giant invited Hawkers executives to come to company headquarters to deliver a presentation on their strategies using Facebook Ads and other tools.

Hawkers Today

Boosting profits and global reach, Betancourt is now directly involved in many of the decisions that get more people to know about Hawkers and how they can improve one’s personal style.

Hawkers continues to be a popular and recognized product for all types of customers, from celebrities to others with limited budgets who still want to look good. Involving social media influencers can expand its reach to more people and create positive messages.

And Betancourt’s vision will continue to lead the way.  “I believe that you have to understand that the world is changing so fast and with the world of markets, the appetites, the cultures, everything changes and more technology, there is more adaptation, it’s needed,” he says.

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