Mike Jeffries, the previous CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch Co, was arrested on Tuesday in Florida, accused of intercourse trafficking and utilizing his perch atop the style clothier to coerce males into intercourse for an opportunity to mannequin for the model.
Based on the indictment, Jeffries, his companion Matthew Smith and an worker of theirs, James Jacobson, allegedly ran a global intercourse trafficking and prostitution ring from 2008 to 2015, a interval that largely overlapped with Jeffries’ time as CEO from 1992 to 2014.
Jeffries was ousted from the corporate almost a decade in the past, however the newest allegations are paying homage to sex-tinged scandals that plagued his tenure, together with a management fashion nearly sank Abercrombie & Fitch.
Abercrombie’s historical past dates to 1892, when it specialised in clothes and baggage for vacationers and outside lovers. However when Jeffries took the helm in 1992, he started remodeling Abercrombie into the premiere teen retailer of the Nineties and early aughts, rebranding it with logo-bedecked clothes and a hyper-sexualized preppy ethos. The corporate launched catalogs that some critics stated on the time verged on comfortable porn, and staffed half-naked buff younger males at retailer entrances. Jeffries additionally discovered nice success in launching the surfer adjoining Hollister model in 2000.
Finally a few of Jeffries’ eyebrow-raising habits got here to the floor. In early 2010s information reviews on his excesses included a questionable use of firm funds on journey, an enormous function for his partner in operating the enterprise, a handbook with detailed directions on how he was to be addressed by workers on the company jet, and the way these workers members ought to gown.
Jeffries additionally exhibited an autocratic streak as a pacesetter, and disdain for folks he thought beneath him: he infamously stated Abercrombie & Fitch was just for “cool” folks. That top-down administration strategy labored properly…till it didn’t.
By the 2010s, his my-way-or-the-highway strategy meant the corporate was lacking essential cultural shifts and falling out of step with its shoppers, who have been changing into much less excited about firm logos and airs of exclusivity. And by late 2014, Jeffries was out after 11 straight quarters of declining same-store gross sales and immeasurable injury to the model.
As Abercrombie scrambled to reorganize itself after Jeffries’ exit, the corporate was run for greater than two years by an “Workplace of the Chairman,” consisting of high executives, together with Fran Horowitz, who went on to change into CEO of the corporate in 2017.
Horowitz was tasked with main shellshocked and demoralized workers. She additionally went in regards to the difficult work of extra clearly delineating the Abercrombie and Hollister manufacturers, which had change into nearly interchangeable by the top of Jeffries reign. Horowitz has constructed a formidable e-commerce enterprise, which now makes up 50% of firm gross sales. And by 2022, after years in retail purgatory, Abercrombie & Fitch Co. revenues lastly rebounded to 2014 ranges. Its shares have risen six-fold within the final decade, and final yr and annual income is zeroing in on $5 billion.
Extra lately, Horowitz launched new initiatives reminiscent of an activewear line a number of years again, and a marriage enterprise this yr. In the meantime, with gross sales up 21% final quarter, A&F’s comeback story is undeniably nonetheless going robust in no small half because of all of the dramas and issues Jeffries precipitated.
