<\/p>\n
\n\tAt Aerie, much of the momentum and success has sprung from doing the unexpected \u2014 at least according to Jennifer Foyle, president and executive creative director of Aerie as well as American Eagle.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe intimate apparel brand, which includes the Offline by Aerie subbrand for activewear and athleisure, has experienced outsized growth, quarter after quarter. In the second quarter of 2026, revenues rose 25 percent to $535.8 million, with comparable sales surging 19 percent. In the first quarter this year, revenues jumped 33 percent, and comparable sales rose 25 percent.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWe have to innovate everyday. So we\u2019re playing around with new ideas right now,\u201d said Foyle speaking at the Wharton Baker Retailing Center CEO Summit in Manhattan, in conversation with Phil Wahba, senior writer at Fortune.<\/p>\n
\n\tLast July, Aerie launched an innovative \u201csleepwear-to-streetwear\u201d concept called Overslept, featuring clothes you can sleep in and run errands in. \u201cWe want to round out our assortments. The Aerie girl keeps on crying for more,\u201d Foyle said, describing the motivation for the launch. \u201cNow we haven\u2019t launched [Overslept] necessarily as a brand yet, but we\u2019re certainly allocating more square footage to it because it\u2019s doing that well right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tSleepwear, she said, started \u201ctaking hold\u201d last year at Aerie, prompting the Overslept launch.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI love building our own brands within our portfolio,\u201d Foyle said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard. It\u2019s very different. Not everyone approaches business that way. You see a lot of collaborations out there. I\u2019m more in the business of trying to create [more of] our own business within a wonderful portfolio of brands that I think we\u2019ve only just started.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cSometimes you stand out by doing what people are not doing, doing what your competition is not doing. That\u2019s how Aerie has won, and that\u2019s how we are relevant today,\u201d Foyle said. \u201cI\u2019m constantly focused on where is that next white space.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tSuccess, she said, starts with \u201cbelief in your brand\u2026.Without that belief you\u2019re not going to win. It\u2019s a crowded field out there. There\u2019s a lot of competition every day. I stare at it, and getting your team rallied around the idea of the brand and what it stands for is probably the most important thing you can do.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cDisruption\u2019s an overused word, but we did need to disrupt, and I think white space is probably something where we realized we could win.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tWhen Aerie was launched in 2006, \u201cWe went up against the behemoth,\u201d Foyle said, referring to Victoria\u2019s Secret. \u201cWe knew we had to be that disruptor\u201d in big and small ways.<\/p>\n
\n\tLike never airbrushing models, and using customers \u201cas our feelers out to the world, to generate content. They were like our first influencers,\u201d Foyle said. \u201cAI is happening. But you know there are more natural ways to get your customer into your brand, and I\u2019m very passionate about that. But I also think in this AI world, we are going to participate, like with demand forecasting and tools. And then there\u2019s the human touch. I think Aerie does that well.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tAnd she goes pretty far with it. \u201cLook, I chase my customers down the street when I see an Aerie bag. I get really excited about it. I ask, \u2018What\u2019s in your bag?’\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\tAerie<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of Aerie<\/p>\n
\n\tAerie was initially focused on intimates but subsequently launched cozy loungewear, and during the pandemic, launched Offline by Aerie. \u201cOne morning I woke up, and I\u2019m really liking this name: Offline. I don\u2019t know where I came up with it. I just woke up, and I went to my legal and I said, \u2018Can we get this trademarked?\u2019 I thought if everyone feels comfortable in Aerie and all the offerings of our assortment in Aerie, I\u2019m like, why would they not feel comfortable in their leggings? Adding leggings was a no-brainer because there\u2019s business out there. I saw that white space. I thought we could disrupt from a price-point standpoint. I thought we had a sweet spot in Offline and could be that disruptor again.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tDuring COVID-19, she decided to launch Offline inside Aerie stores. She said that there are currently more than 100 Offline freestanding stores. \u201cIt\u2019s an activewear line, and we launched it during COVID,\u201d at a time when online shopping exploded and many stores, including Aerie, were closed. \u201cI said everyone\u2019s shopping online, let\u2019s have the courage to do that. It was doing what people would not expect. But why wouldn\u2019t we be driving something forward, entertaining our customers and doing something that I think was unheard of? I mean launching a brand during COVID was sort of brave.\u201d<\/p>\n
At American Eagle, which like Aerie is operated by American Eagle Outfitters, \u201cDenim is the core out of everything we do. Jeans are the core,\u201d Foyle said. Aerie, she said, started with intimates and undies, as the core which expanded to leggings and Offline.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWhen you have that distinctive core business, there is some crossover [between] brands, but we go back to our core to make sure that we\u2019re always thinking about that and wardrobing her.\u2026Trends are happening so fast. We just have to be getting in front of it and seeing where we think that customer is going next.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tBut she stressed, \u201cStay with your product. Sometimes you have to ride the tide a little bit, but make sure you\u2019re savvy about how you ride that tide. Make sure you plan conservatively, but know that there\u2019s an outcome, and look for that outlier \u2014 how you\u2019re going to get through that hump? It will happen. In today\u2019s world, you do have to pivot fast. But again, I do think a brand is a marathon, not a sprint. Kudos to Ralph Lauren. Look at what Ralph has done recently. They wouldn\u2019t have come back if they didn\u2019t have the soul of that brand, and they look great.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tFoyle said she\u2019s stepping on the gas at Aerie and Offline while there\u2019s still work to be done at American Eagle which has been underperforming lately. \u201cLook, American Eagle is still so relevant. There\u2019s 80 percent awareness out there. The customer still loves us. They want us to win, so that\u2019s all good news. But there was some work to do. It\u2019s still underway. We just hired some new strategic hires I think [will] really help me now accelerate and move American Eagle into the future.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWe have over 21 million customers in our portfolio of brands. We still have an opportunity to get the American Eagle customer to shop Aerie and to get the Offline customer to shop American Eagle. There\u2019s a lot of growth opportunity for American Eagle, and again, we\u2019ve pulled back. We\u2019ve had some store closures. We\u2019re in some tough malls. We want to be in the best malls. We want to show up. We want our customer to have that experience. Go to SoHo. It\u2019s the best example of all three brands. There\u2019s still opportunity while at the same time we\u2019re going after market share. In today\u2019s world in retail, there\u2019s not a lot of growth. There\u2019s mild growth. So it is a market share game.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tAt American Eagle, Foyle added, \u201cWe\u2019re just getting some of that cultural relevancy, working through our marketing, and I\u2019m excited about what\u2019s to come. But again, some of this doesn\u2019t happen overnight. If you do it right, and if you do it with care and thoughtfulness, you\u2019ll come out stronger.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tThe Jay H. Baker Retailing Center is an interdisciplinary industry research center at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. It was established in 2002 through a generous gift by Jay and Patty Baker. Jay Baker, former president and director of the Kohl\u2019s Corp., is a graduate of the Wharton School, class of 1956. The summit drew a crowd of 150 including retail and brand CEOs and presidents, industry consultants and media, and at the dinner the night before, honored Martha Stewart with Wharton\u2019s Retail Excellence Award.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\tAn Offline by Aerie store in Westport, Conn. <\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tKellie Ell \/ WWD<\/p>\n
#Whats #Driving #Big #Gains #Aerie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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