Dive Brief:
- G-III Apparel Group bought a 12% ownership stake in Madrid-based All We Wear Group, the company announced last week.
- As part of the investment, All We Wear Group now becomes the agent for DKNY, Donna Karan and Karl Lagerfeld in Spain and Portugal. G-III said the deal was part of its plan to accelerate expansion in Europe.
- G-III announced the deal on the same day as its Q1 earnings for the company’s 2025 fiscal year, in which it reported net sales of $609.7 million, a slight increase from $606.6 million for Q1 last year. Net income for the quarter was $5.8 million.
Dive Insight:
G-III said the deal with All We Wear Group will help the company unlock the Spain and Portugal markets as it looks to Europe as a growth opportunity.
The company “plans to leverage AWWG’s notable presence in India” to expand its portfolio of key brands, starting with DKNY.
All We Wear Group, owned by M1 Group, L Catterton and its founder Carlos Ortega, is the platform for the Hackett, Pepe Jeans and Façonnable brands, according to the press release outlining the deal. The European group also manages the Iberian business for PVH Corp., parent company of Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein.
Morris Goldfarb, G-III chairman and CEO, said the deal with All We Wear Group helps the company accelerate its strategic priorities.
“It not only affords us the opportunity to meaningfully invest in a company with iconic brands, but also represents a sizable international presence with a strong infrastructure and talented leadership team that will benefit our efforts to scale our European business,” Goldfarb said in the release. “At the same time, we look forward to supporting AWWG’s overall growth and advancement of their brands here in North America.”
In an earnings call with analysts last week, Goldfarb said the investment with All We Wear Group would help both companies expand their businesses, and reiterated that G-III views one of its opportunities for growth as “conquering Europe.”
“We have approximately, all told, somewhere around $400 million of European distribution between Karl Lagerfeld, Vilebrequin, DKNY, and its early stages,” Goldfarb said on the call. “... This is a big step for us. We’ve taken an equity stake in AWWG, we will grow that equity stake, double the equity stake in about 30 days, we believe, and we have the ability of buying it all. And they’re a dominant European distributor of three very important brands, they do about $650 million in current sales with our contribution, I think their growth would be a little bit more aggressive.”
In the earnings release, Goldfarb said G-III remains “cautiously optimistic,” and reaffirmed the company’s net sales outlook for the 2025 fiscal year. The company expects net sales of about $3.2 billion and net income between $170 million and $175 million.
The financial outlook anticipates about $60 million in incremental expenses, which G-III said was associated with the launches of Donna Karan, Nautica and Halston.
In March 2023, G-III announced it was planning to grow the Donna Karan and Karl Lagerfeld brands to make up for expiring licensing deals related to Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger. That same month, G-III Apparel announced a licensing deal for Nautica products, including for jeans, sportswear, suit separates and dresses.
In the recent earnings call, Goldfarb attributed the company’s net sales results to double-digit sales increases at DKNY and Karl Lagerfeld.
In June 2023, G-III signed a 25-year master license agreement with Xcel Brands for the Halston brand, in which G-III will design and produce all categories of men’s and women’s Halston products and distribute them globally.
