obnoxious?
That's just one of the questions being
asked regarding Abercrombie & Fitch
( ANF) CEO Mike Jeffries after a
Change.org petition demanded
Jeffries, "stop telling teens they
aren't beautiful; make clothes for
teens of all sizes!"
The petition picked up steam after
BusinessInsider.com and others ran
stories pointing out that Abercrombie
doesn't stock XL or XXL women's
clothing, allegedly because they don't
want overweight women wearing
their brand.
Another sensationalist media attack?
Not really. Jeffries himself addressed
his marketing strategy in a 2006
interview with Salon. Said Jeffries:
Candidly, we go after the cool kids.
We go after the attractive all-
American kid with a great attitude
and a lot of friends. A lot of people
don’t belong [in our clothes], and they
can’t belong. Are we exclusionary?
Absolutely. Those companies that are
in trouble are trying to target
everybody: young, old, fat, skinny.
But then you become totally vanilla.
You don’t alienate anybody, but you
don’t excite anybody, either.
It's a staggeringly stupid thing for
Jeffries to have said but it's not as
though A&F's strategy isn't obvious
within minutes of entering a store. In
the attached piece, Breakout Co-Host
Matt Nesto points out that ANF
shareholders include fund juggernauts
like Fidelity Investments which owns
ANF shares in more than a dozen
different funds.
"Abercrombie has been run by Mike
Jeffries for 20 years and he's been
running his mouth for 20 years."
There's been no shortage of
controversy during Jeffries' tenure.
A&F has been criticized for selling T-
Shirts with slogans with "shock value"
marketed to the aforementioned
"cool kid" customers. The items,
including a thong for schoolgirls, have
been pulled from the shelves but
Jeffries remains.
It would be ironic if Jeffries was to
survive selling apparel with things like
"Gentlemen Prefer Tig Ol' Bitties,"
but was to be taken down as the
result of an online petition. The CEO's
performance should have been more
than enough to raise the ire of Wall
and Main Street long ago.
Nesto correctly points out that
Abecrombie is expected to post
record revenues, but shareholders
care more about the bottom line than
they do about the top. Since Jeffries'
infamous 2006 sitdown with Salon,
ANF shares have fallen more than
17% compared to a 28% rise for the
S&P500.
Taking out Jeffries for offensive
comments he made more than 7
years ago would be akin to putting Al
Capone in prison for tax evasion. The
man's body of work has earned his
dismissal, the details of exactly why
Jeffries gets dismissed are almost
irrelevant.
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