Wholesaler: Men's Sportswear, Women's Sportswear, Knitwear, Sweaters.
Hampshire Group, Limited
Hampshire Group, Limited is a leading U.S. provider of women's and men's sweaters, wovens and knits, and a growing designer and marketer of branded apparel. Its customers include leading retailers such as Macy's, Kohl's, JC Penney, Dillard's, Bloomingdale's and Nordstrom, for whom it provides trend-right, branded apparel. Hampshire's owned brands include Spring+Mercer®, its newly-launched “better” apparel line, Designers Originals®, the Company's first brand and still a top-seller in department stores, as well as Mercer Street Studio®, Requirements®, and RQT®. The Company also licenses the Geoffrey Beene® and Dockers® labels for men's sweaters, both of which are market leaders in their categories, and recently acquired licenses for classification labels of the Joseph Abboud® and Alexander Julian® brands for men's tops and bottoms.
Hampshire Group consists of three distinct divisions: Hampshire Designers and Item-Eyes for women's apparel and Hampshire Brands for men's. All offer products under several brand names as well as private label to multiple channels of distribution, including national and regional department stores and mass market retailers.
Hampshire Designers
One of the foremost designers and marketers of women's sweaters and cut and sewn knits, Hampshire Designers offers a wide range of looks to key retailers in the United States. Brand names include Designers Originals®, Spring+Mercer®, Mercer Street Studio®, Luxe360® and Hampshire Studio®. Each label has its own sensibility and target tier of distribution including JCPenney, Macy's, Dillard's, Bloomingdales and Nordstrom. New fabrications and lighter weights have expanded the business while the recent addition of the Spring+Mercer® label has been well received by retailers and consumers alike and has given the division entree into a higher price point category.
Item-Eyes
Sold to the moderate sportswear departments of key retailers including Kohl's, JCPenney, Sears, Stage Stores and Goody's, Item-Eyes® offers related women's sportswear under several brand names. Requirements®, RQT®, Nouveaux®, REQ® and Tara Ryan® are positioned to sell to a specific retail channel as well as customer profile. The product offering in each brand includes coordinating jackets, sweaters, skirts, pants and soft dressing pieces. Each label is designed to appeal to a wide cross section of multiple customers and address all the facets of her varied lifestyle. Newness comes every season in fabrication, silhouette, pattern and color.
Hampshire Brands
The men's division of the company, Hampshire Brands, has a strong presence in a very competitive market. Marketing a wide range of knitwear under the licensed Geoffrey Beene® and Dockers® brands as well as the proprietary Spring+Mercer® the men's division is a leader in its category. Already selling to a broad range of accounts including Macy's, JCPenney, Kohl's, and Sears the exciting addition of Joseph Abboud Components® for a Fall 2008 retail launch will allow the division to expand it's product range from primarily sweaters to other product categories shipped year round.
History of HampshireGroup:
1956:
Predecessor company begins selling acrylic sweaters under the Designers Originals® label.
1977:
Hampshire Group, Limited is formed through the merger of two unrelated companies.
1992:
Hampshire Group has initial public offering of its common stock.
1995:
Segue, Ltd., a designer and importer of novelty sweaters, is acquired.
1996:
Hampshire sells over 10 million sweaters.
1997:
Hampshire Investments is formed to diversify the Company's asset base. The company obtains license to sell men's sweaters under the Geoffrey Beene® label.
1998:
The ladies hosiery business is sold to a management group.
1999:
Levi Strauss & Co. licenses the company to sell sweaters under it Dockers® label.
2000:
All manufacturing plants are sold as the company continues to build a worldwide sourcing network. Item-Eyes, Inc., a company selling related separates primarily under its Requirements® brand, is acquired by the company.
2002:
The company sells approximately 19 million sweaters and approximately 5.5 million units of related separates.
2003:
The Company sold Hampshire Investments, Limited, its real estate company, to a management group for 700,000 shares of Hampshire Group, Limited common stock.The company introduced the Spring + Mercer® brand.
2004:
The company introduced RQT® for women's related separates. The company consolidated its distribution centers in California to expedite deliveries to its customers
2007:
The company signs licensing agreement with JA Apparel for Joseph Abboud® Components Line.
2007:
The company moves into state of the art showroom/office space consolidating the women's divisions.
2008:
The company launches Luxe360, a more refined and versatile fabrication marketed under the Designers Originals, Hampshire Studio and Mercer Street Studio labels.
2008:
The company launches REQ, a contemporary related separates collection exclusively at Sears
