Mall brands have evolved beyond the need for malls. Now, they’re just “brands.” Extremely vital brands.
Now, that first point may be up for debate — some posit that, despite popular opinion, malls are undergoing a sort of metamorphosis and aren’t quite dead — but the latter is not.
Once staid labels like GAP, J.Crew, Banana Republic and Abercrombe & Fitch are instead becoming increasingly covetable while once-shakey financials find impressive footing.
These clothing companies once held it down as the cornerstones of America’s shopping malls but they’re currently riding a wave back to the forefront of closets around the country and beyond.
Part of it is down to savvy rebrands set in motion years ago. Part of it is new creative direction and trend-conscious management that’s clawing terrain back from new-gen upstarts and ultra-fast fashion companies, attaining impressive stability in the increasingly competitive region of ultra-approachable casualwear — i.e. mall fashion.
And it’s all happening simultaneously.
Abercrombie’s rebrand, so exhaustively heralded online that even its summer shirts notch headlines, has proven so successful that its marketable wins have inspired case studies. Once inextricable from its intentionally curated aura of exclusivity, Abercrombie’s stores and website now look coolly inviting (and maybe even a little familiar).
The clothes and their presentation both borrow from winningly TikTok-able trends; the womens’ section leans more than a little quiet luxury (complimentary) while the mens’ offering dabbles in Instagram-friendly streetwear grunge.
Solid stuff, especially for the youthful shoppers in Abercrombie’s target demo.
Meanwhile, under the direction of NOAH founder Brendon Babenzien, J.Crew’s more mature menswear client is savoring a more urbane shopping experience.
The clothes are classically wearable, a little prep and a little rugged. Following Babenzien’s arrival, J.Crew enjoyed a snappy viral hit with its Giant Chino and steadily served newness with tasteful collaborators too cool to partner with the yesteryear’s mall brands.
Mere months after the New York Times proclaimed that J.Crew had again found its way, the nearly 80-year-old company staked its claim with flagship stores in New York’s fashion-first SoHo neighborhood.
Moneywise, we’re not quite talking Madewell figures — J.Crew’s sibling company is still faring far stronger — but J.Crew isn’t slipping, either.
A similar sense of accessible urbanity has lead the way at the retooled Banana Republic, which aimed to be a “quiet luxury destination” going into 2024 (that Peter Do collaboration was basically a mission statement).
It, too, opened a splashy store in SoHo mere weeks before J.Crew.
And at the flagship label of BR parent company GAP: a organic youth boom.
While it was intentionally setting up a series of smart collaborations with culturemakers like Dapper Dan, Sean Wotherspoon and Palace Skateboards, GAP was enjoying incidental TikTok virality and shored-up share prices.
And its July 2024 team-up with hyper-buzzy (and LVMH-powered) Madhappy is a solid hinge for GAP’s recent winning streak, reflecting GAP’s sudden popularity among Gen Z through a partner label only too happy to lens a campaign steeped in overt stylistic homage to GAP’s ’90s heyday.
A full-circle moment even for the folks who didn’t initially experience it.
This is all happening while mall staples like Limited Too, Claires and Victoria’s Secret plot a return, the latter by reviving its runway show (I could’ve sworn that already happened but, hey).
VS is one of the few contemporary non-success stories among the mall brand set, its dominance dinged by athleisure giants and celeb-fronted shapewear titans. But that the VS reconfiguration is going down at this moment speaks to the mall brand ascent. And they ain’t all gonna be winners.
That being said, though, pseudo mall brands — retailers that specialize in fast-casual fare but are too new to actually exist in ye olde malls — are very much on the rise.
COS, the nearly 15-year-old H&M sub-label, is coming into its own while Brandy Melville, the enigmatic (and surprisingly Randian) one-size tweenwear maker, modestly opened a new store that sells slightly larger clothes. As in size medium.
It all adds up to an unshakeable sensation that today’s hottest young brands are the really, really old (and corporate) ones. Old dog learns new trick, recaptures the audience that was once its bread and butter a generation ago.
Maybe there actually is hope for IRL malls yet.