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Wall Street Journal
BUSINESS
JULY 24, 2009
Retailers Highlight Accessories
With New Wardrobes a Tough Sell, Chains Try Belts, Bangles and Bags
By ELIZABETH HOLMES
Clothing retailers are expanding their collections of belts, bangles and bags in hopes these high-margin accessories will boost slumping sales.
Casual wear retailer J.Crew Group Inc. opened its first accessories boutique last month in New York and soon will release its third accessories catalog. Accessories accounted for about $165 million, or 12% of its sales last year, almost double the amount in 2004.
Gap Inc. launched the first accessories-only branch of Banana Republic, called Edition, in May. And Henri Bendel, part of the Limited Brands Inc. portfolio, is expanding its offerings this summer with six more stand-alone accessories stores.
Retailers said jewelry, belts and scarves remain impulse-purchases that don't require a lot of budgeting, unlike a new wardrobe. "It's a little bit of a candy moment," says Jenna Lyons, J.Crew's creative director. "You don't have to try it on. You can just take it to the cash register."
Gap is testing an accessories-only store, Edition, in San Francisco, above.
Jewelry and bags can yield as much as double the 40% profit margins of apparel, though both vary greatly. The goods take up less space and have more of a timeless appeal, which helps retailers avoid the types of costly markdowns that have hurt results this year. Ed Bucciarelli, chief executive of Limited's Henri Bendel unit, describes the category as "season-less...which obviously speaks to the profit."
And sales are still growing. Women's accessory sales by units for the three months ended April 30 were up 2% from a year earlier, according to market-research firm NPD Group. Women's jewelry-item sales were up 5%, and men's and women's watches and sunglasses were up 11% and 5%, respectively. By contrast, women's apparel sales in units were down about 5.6%.
There are signs shoppers are willing to spend. More than a third of respondents in a Shopping Habits Survey conducted by Shop It To Me, an online personal shopping service, said they were "still splurging" on shoes, and nearly a quarter said the same of handbags. Just 15% of the 940 respondents said they were still splurging on work clothing.
For shoppers such as Julie Chang, a new necklace or a handbag can provide an easy -- and less expensive -- outfit update. Ms. Chang, a 30-year-old senior developer for an online educational services company in California, recently bought a double-strand confetti necklace from J.Crew for $98 because of its versatility.
"You can't wear dresses too often, or people will notice," says Ms. Chang. "But you can take a necklace and wear it on many different outfits."
J.Crew jewelry, which launched in just 13 stores about two years ago, "is becoming a business totally unto itself," Millard Drexler, chairman and chief executive, said in a May conference call on the New York company's fiscal first-quarter results.
J.Crew opened a separate space for its accessories in the brand's store in the trendy SoHo neighborhood. Elsewhere, the jewelry is interspersed with the clothing to help shoppers envision entire outfits and add "an immediate approachability" to the pieces, says Ms. Lyons. For example, in most stores a rack of pearl necklaces sits on a table with knits of complimentary colors.
These retailers' push into accessories are also designed to chip away at a mid-priced business now dominated by department stores, said industry observers.
Before the recession, so-called aspirational purchases by shoppers spending above their income level drove sales at high-end retailers, according to Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst with NPD Group. The economic downturn has halted that trend. "Luxury isn't going to get that midlevel consumer back anytime soon," Mr. Cohen says.
Retailers now hope to win over those consumers. Gap is testing the Banana Republic-branded accessories store Edition in the upscale Westfield San Francisco Centre. The company describes the brand as "affordable luxury." The majority of the pieces are under $100. Handbags are among the most expensive, with some priced above $400.
Lower-priced accessories concepts have failed to attract the masses in the past. In 2006, Limited opened six Diva London stores but closed them within a year, saying only that the brand "was not meeting our expectations." A spokeswoman describes the brand as "the adult version of Claire's," a mall-based teenage accessories brand with hundreds of inexpensive items.
Limited hopes to have more success with its Henri Bendel brand. At the end of April, Bendel announced that it intends to discontinue apparel sales at its flagship store on Fifth Avenue. It is reducing its selling floor space and offering only accessories, beauty products and other items suitable for gift giving.
Outside New York, the company is expanding its boutique shops with Bendel-branded merchandise. The small outposts, about 2,000-square-feet apiece, will carry everything from bangles to flip-flops, all with the Bendel logo or brown-and-white stripes. Mr. Bucciarelli describes the pricing strategy as "prestige, not luxury."
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page B6
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