Abercrombie to drop logo from clothing products
Abercrombie & Fitch is to phase out selling its branded line of clothing in a bid to tempt back shoppers as sales at the American clothing brand fell by six per cent to $891m.
The retailer, which has been hit by the advancement of cheaper, fast-fashion outlets such as H&M and Forever 21, has been pushing forward with alternative clothing lines of late, and recently introduced a new Back-to-School collection ahead of the Autumn/Winter season.
The move is a significant shift for Abercrombie which has historically based much of its branding around the logo.
Mike Jeffries, chief executive officer said the retailer will remain “highly focused” on returning to top-line growth and driving long-term value.
"In the past quarter, we believe we have made great progress in evolving the fashion component of our assortment, and this progress is clearly evident in our Back-to-School presentation. In a continued challenging environment, our sales for the second quarter were somewhat below plan, but we have seen modest improvement since the Back-to-School floorset.
“We are confident that the evolution of our assortment will drive further improvements going forward, in particular as we move past the headwind of adverse likes in our logo business as we work to strategically reduce that element in our assortment.”
Abercrombie said that marketing spend in the second quarter was down 6 percent to $111m compared to $117.6m in the same period last year.
Following the announcement shares in the company fell 8.5 per cent.
Jeffries faced heavy criticism last year when a 2006 interview with the CEO was republished online.
“In every school, there are the cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids. Candidly, we go after the cool kids,” he stated.
"We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don't belong (in our clothes), and they can't belong."
Abercrombie has also been criticised for calling its staff 'models', and for its erotically charged advertising which has drawn complaints from family interest groups.