In a lyric on her latest album,\u00a0Beyonc\u00e9 sings\u00a0\u201cdenim on denim, on denim, on denim.\u201d<\/p>\n
Levi Strauss\u00a0shoppers are taking that advice to heart. Levi Strauss executives are ecstatic.<\/p>\n
Western wear is booming as consumers opt for top-to-bottom denim looks, the iconic, 171-year-old clothing maker said on Wednesday. As the style wins cultural favor, its popularity is juicing denim niches \u2014 like shirts, skirts and dresses \u2014 that fall outside Levi\u2019s widely-known blue jean offerings.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe growing popularity of Western wear is at an all-time high,\u201d CEO Michelle Gass told analysts Wednesday night after the California-based retailer\u2019s latest earnings report for the quarter ended in May.<\/p>\n
A Western renaissance has been gaining traction over the past several months, sending stylish shoppers searching for pieces like jeans, boots and cowboy hats. Levi\u2019s scored a huge hit when its jean brand was referenced in Beyonc\u00e9\u2019s song \u201cLevii\u2019s Jeans,\u201d released earlier this year.<\/p>\n
Beyond Beyonc\u00e9\u2019s\u00a0chart-topping \u201cCowboy Carter\u201d album, the increased ubiquity of Western style has also been tied to a fashion line unveiled by\u00a0Louis Vuitton\u00a0earlier this year and Taylor Swift\u2019s ongoing Eras Tour.<\/p>\n
Gass, who took over as Levi Strauss CEO earlier this year after previously serving as the CEO at\u00a0Kohl\u2019s, has touted that denim is having a moment in the popular imagination, with Western wear trending more broadly throughout the culture.<\/p>\n
More specific data shared on the company\u2019s earnings call Wednesday showed how Levi Strauss is taking advantage of demand for denim beyond its popular \u201c501\u201d jeans. Sales of denim skirts, jumpsuits and dresses all at least doubled in the latest quarter, Gass said. Western shirts sales are also up significantly, she said, especially on the women\u2019s side.<\/p>\n
Levi is finding success in what the 55-year-old chief executive described as a new strategy of trying to dress customers denim \u2014 from head-to-toe.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur new focus is, yes, continuing to own jeans, but taking that denim top to bottom,\u201d Gass said on\u00a0CNBC\u2019s \u201cMad Money\u201d\u00a0late Wednesday.\u00a0While noting that the denim skirt and dress categories haven\u2019t been historically large for the company, now \u201cthey\u2019re exploding,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
To be sure, the\u00a0well-documented denim craze\u00a0alone isn\u2019t necessarily impressing Wall Street. Levi Strauss tumbled more than 15% on Thursday in response to its latest numbers, its second worst day since going public in early 2019.<\/p>\n
Levi Strauss posted $1.44 billion in revenue in the fiscal second quarter,\u00a0slightly missing\u00a0the $1.45 billion consensus forecast of analysts polled by LSEG despite the denim boom. The company\u2019s finance chief told CNBC that the sales miss was driven by unfavorable foreign exchange rates and weakness in the Dockers brand.<\/p>\n
On the other hand, Levi Strauss earned 16 cents per share, excluding items, ahead of the 11-cent average estimate by analysts.<\/p>\n
In the year through Wednesday, shares had run up amid the buzz around the cotton-based fabric and the resurgence of Western clothing. Following Thursday\u2019s drop, the stock is still up more than 18% on the year. For comparison, shares of\u00a0Kontoor Brands, the parent of denim brands Wrangler and Lee, have risen 5% year to date.<\/p>\n
Wells Fargo analyst Ike Boruchow said that for \u201cone of the most crowded longs in the space today,\u201d Levi\u2019s second-quarter release \u201cwas simply not good enough.\u201d In other words, the company missed what was an admittedly high bar, he said.<\/p>\n
Citigroup analyst Paul Lejuez, meanwhile, thought Levi\u2019s most recent quarter was good, but cited the wholesale business\u2019s performance and the potential for European sales to continue struggling in the second half of the year as grounds for concern.<\/p>\n
Lejuez pointed to several tailwinds as grounds for optimism on the stock. Two of his reasons driving excitement \u2014 new styles and fits \u2014 are common for a clothing maker.<\/p>\n
Lejuez\u2019s final one was more unique: Beyonc\u00e9.<\/p>\n
\u2014 CNBC\u2019s Gabrielle Fonrouge and Julie Coleman contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n In a lyric on her latest album,\u00a0Beyonc\u00e9 sings\u00a0\u201cdenim on denim, on denim, on denim.\u201d Levi Strauss\u00a0shoppers are taking that advice to heart. Levi Strauss executives are ecstatic. Western wear is booming as consumers opt for top-to-bottom denim looks, the iconic, 171-year-old clothing maker said on Wednesday. As the style wins cultural favor, its popularity is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":5670,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5669"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5669\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}