California Apparel News

After three years as head of Vince Holding Corp., Jill Granoff has resigned as the company’s chief executive.

Granoff’s resignation comes as a major management shake-up is taking place at the company, which makes chic and elegantly understated clothing at a higher-end price range.

Also leaving the company is Karin Gregersen, Vince’s president and chief creative officer.

Granoff will remain the CEO during a transition period “to ensure an orderly and effective leadership transition,” the company said in a statement.

“While this is a bittersweet decision for me, it is the right time for me to pass the reins to the next leader,” Granoff said.

The company’s board of directors plans to work with an executive-search firm to find a replacement for Granoff, who is a veteran executive in the apparel and cosmetics industry and at one time worked at Liz Claiborne Inc. as an executive vice president in charge of Juicy Couture, Lucky Brand and Kate Spade.

“Jill has been a tremendous steward for the Vince brand for the last three years,” said Marc Leder, Vince chairman. “She has shown great leadership during her tenure, and her commitment to seeing us through this orderly transition speaks volumes about her professionalism.”

As part of Vince’s reorganization, the company has hired Livia Lee as the new senior vice president of merchandising, reporting directly to Granoff in the interim and then to her successor. Lee joins the company on July 20.

With Lee’s hiring, the company has reorganized the operational reporting structure, with merchandising for men’s and women’s apparel, accessories, retail and e-commerce merchandising as well as visual merchandising reporting to her.

Vince has its corporate offices in New York and its design studio in Los Angeles. It was founded in 2002 in Los Angeles by Rea Laccone and Christopher LaPolice. The brand is known for its cashmere sweaters, silk tops and understated elegance and is carried at stores including Bloomingdale’s and Nordstrom.

In 2006, the Vince brand was acquired by Kellwood Co., an apparel venture that later was purchased in 2008 by an affiliate of Sun Capital Partners in a leveraged buyout.

In 2013, Vince went public as a separate entity from Kellwood. It is traded on the New York Stock Exchange. For fiscal 2015, the company had a profit of $35.72 million on $340.4 million in revenue.