California Apparel News

In an increasingly competitive mall market, Pacific Sunwear is gambling on emerging brands to give the retailer a competitive edge.

Costa Mesa, Calif.–based men’s label Sandanista is one of the emerging brands to be exclusively sold at PacSun. Sandanista bowed in August selling in 100 PacSun locations. In August, Anaheim, Calif.–based PacSun also inked an exclusive licensing deal with label Modern Amusement and debuted Hurley’s Weezer capsule collection.

Sandanista was created by the designers of boutique fashion brand Comune, also based in Costa Mesa, Calif. Frank Delgadillo, founder of Comune, said his company initially pitched the brand to PacSun in late 2009 to surf this wave of emerging lines at the retailer. Sandanista got a green light in January 2010.

“It’s a progressive-thinking, big chain,” Delgadillo said of PacSun, which runs a fleet of 883 stores in 50 states. By picking up Sandanista, PacSun demonstrated that the retailer is willing to take more merchandising risks. “It’s for the older brother of the PacSun consumer,” Delgadillo said.

Sandanista’s demographic fits nicely into PacSun’s new direction, said Jeff Van Sinderen, a retail analyst at Los Angeles–based financial firm B.Riley & Co.

“Modern Amusement resonated with an older customer,” Van Sinderen said. “This partnership with Sandanista shows that PacSun is continuing its effort to reach an older customer compared to some of its competitors. It’s not easy to do.”

Teen retailer Abercrombie & Fitch tried to appeal to a post-collegiate demographic with its Ruehl label, but it shuttered the short-lived concept in 2009.

PacSun did not respond to a request for comment for this article. However, PacSun chief executive Gary Schoenfeld told California Apparel News in June that he intended to make PacSun a destination for new and up-and-coming brands.

Sandanista is wholesale priced $10 to $20 less than Comune, which is sold in boutiques such as American Rag, Jack’s Surfboards, Villains and Revolve Clothing. Sandanista’s name was inspired by the Sandinistas, the revolutionary political group that held power in Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990 and a 1980 album by English punk band The Clash. The logo of the fashion label is an “S” hovering over two crossbones.

Sandanista’s first collection offers six woven shirts, four denim pants, two chino pants, three T-shirt styles and two pieces of outerwear. Retail price points range from $48 to $52 for denim and $18 to $21 for T-shirts. A Sandanista cotton sweater features an asymmetric cut and sleeves bearing slit pockets.

Delgadillo said he hopes Sandanista will be part of PacSun’s brand mix for a long time. One benefit to dealing exclusively with a single large retailer is that Delgadillo will only have one set of buyers to satisfy, rather than fielding requests for changes from multiple stores.

Sandanista is available at only one other retailer, the Japanese chain Beams.

Delgadillo said his next step will be transforming his company, Sekses Distribution, into a brand incubator where more emerging brands will be developed.

PacSun will continue to support emerging brands with its sponsorship of Generation Next, a design competition produced by O’Neill Clothing and Teen Vogue. The Oct. 9 event will be held at the Avalon Hollywood nightclub in Los Angeles. The winner of the competition will have his or her winning designs sold exclusively at PacSun.—Andrew Asch