London – Change is under foot once more at US fashion company Ralph Lauren
Corporation. Following news that Ralph Lauren cut a number of roles and its
debut ‘See Now, Buy Now’ show at New York Fashion Week, the fashion
retailer is set to shift its Denim & Supply business into one of three main
brands, namely Polo Ralph Lauren.
The repositioning of Denim & Supply within the Polo Ralph Lauren brand is
said to be part of Ralph Lauren’s Corp. ‘Way Forward Plan’, reports WWD.
“In our Way Forward Plan, one of the key pillars was to focus on the core,
and evolve the brand and the business from that. One part of that is to
focus on the three core brands — Ralph Lauren, Polo Ralph Lauren and Lauren
by Ralph Lauren,” said Stefan Larsson, president and chief executive
officer in an interview with WWD.
“When we looked at Denim & Supply — denim has always been a core part of
the authentic American style that Ralph has created — we decided to grow
the denim business [from] where we have the most growth, and that is within
Polo,” he added. The company foresees an relatively easy transitioning
period for its Denim & Supply customers, as Larsson claims many shoppers of
the brand are already purchasing Ralph Lauren’s other brands.
Larsson added that there will be no additional redundancies following the
restructuring changes, and that Ralph Lauren Corp. will not be updating its
guidance for the current fiscal year as the company had already taken the
move into account when it shared its assessments of costs last month.
However, all initiatives under the Way Forward Plan are predicted to have a
larger impact during the second half of fiscal 2017 than the second
quarter.
The folding of Denim & Supply is part of the wider changes Ralph Lauren
Corp. has under taken to strengthen the company’s foundation, said Larsson,
as by adding Denim back into the core Polo Ralph Lauren brand will put the
brand “closer to the consumer.”
At the moment, there will be no changes made to Ralph Lauren’s Club Monaco
brand or the RLX Golf Brand.
Photo: Ralph Lauren Denim & Supply, Facebook