Yahoo Lifestyle Ganni, the Fast-growing Danish Fashion Brand, Arrives on Madison Avenue
On the heels of its Paris Fashion Week debut, Ganni will open a flagship Friday at 1055 Madison Avenue, its fifth store in New York City and its 25th in the U.S.
The Danish fashion house already has stores in New York’s SoHo neighborhood, the Flatiron District, Bleecker Street, and Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
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“As you know, obviously with New York being a key fashion city — we have today a good presence in New York but unfortunately we’re not yet covering the Upper East Side of Manhattan — it sounded like an obvious choice for us to enter Madison and to be able to broaden our customer base,” said Laura du Rusquec, chief executive officer of Ganni, who joined in April from Balenciaga where she was the deputy CEO.
“Madison Avenue has a reach not only for New York Uptown clients, but also has a reach for international tourism that we’d like to catch. It sounded like an obvious choice for us,” she said, in a telephone interview Thursday.
The Madison Avenue store, which spans 2,280 square feet, reflects Ganni’s distinctive vision of modern luxury and was designed to create a homey atmosphere. It is situated near such stores as Reformation, Agnès b, Veronica Beard and Barbour.
The Ganni Madison Avenue store features a curated selection of artwork and bespoke gold brass cladding statements across the facade, floating walls and door handles to create a refined aesthetic. Bespoke furniture, props and display elements crafted from recycled materials, including plastic waste and recycled rubber, align with Ganni’s commitment to a more responsible fashion industry. The store was designed by architectural firm Stamuli, a Stockholm-based design and architectural and seeding studio. Ganni is a certified B Corp.
“We see Madison as a flagship for us. What could happen in the future would be potentially relocating to have bigger stores, but I think in terms of number of stores [in New York] I think we’re covered,” she said.
Ganni began opening retail stores in the U.S. in 2019, and has been on an aggressive growth strategy. The U.S. is the company’s largest market. “We see a very nice connection between our brand equity and our U.S. client base, and there is room for us to expand in the U.S.,” said du Rusquec.
The brand, which has stores in such cities as Los Angeles, Miami, Austin, and Houston, is contemplating opening stores in Los Angeles, Chicago and Las Vegas next year, with the ambition of opening 10 new U.S. stores in the next 24 months. Globally, the brand has 75 stores.
When considering real estate, both malls and on-street stores are considered. “Actually both work, it really depends on the city and the client base of the city. It’s just the matter of the right opportunity at the right moment,” she said.
In 2023, the global company had volume of $170 million.
The strategy behind the Madison Avenue store, which is located near 80th Street, is to nurture a clienteling approach where they will be hosting events, displaying accessories in a stronger way, and showcasing their runway collection. “We see the Madison store as the window of this new trajectory that we’ve been working on in the past month,” she said.
After a decade as the breakout brand of Copenhagen Fashion Week, Ganni decamped to Paris in September for its runway show, as reported. The move was meant to position the Danish brand in the center of the busiest week of the fashion month calendar and prepare the company for its next stage of growth.
Asked to describe the customer Ganni is going after, du Rusquec said, “She’s bold, she’s creative, she’s confident and progressively minded. She has her own personal style, and can go from luxury to premium to pre-loved. She just owns her own style and she creates her own look, and she’s an advocate of positive change. She has new ideas and is value-led. This is how we see her. We see that woman everywhere in all the countries,” she said.
She described the clothes as “joyful, effortless and comfortable.”
She said Ganni’s clients don’t choose to shop there because it’s a B Corp., but many clients discover it along the way and feel reinforced to purchase or experience the Ganni world because of those values. “But it matters to us so much and is core to why we do our business,” she said.
The Madison Avenue store will showcase Ganni’s design-led mainline collections, starting with both fall and holiday, alongside the limited-edition Ganni x New Balance sneaker collaboration that launched Nov. 20. Accessories, in particular, are getting bigger play at the new location. Among Ganni’s signature pieces are the Bou bag, crafted from recycled leather and the bestselling Buckle ballerina flats.
As a special tribute to New York, the store will offer a custom blue-striped long-sleeve polo shirt, featuring “NYC” embroidered on the nape, and retailing for $235.
Ganni offers extended sizing. For example, RTW options go from sizes EU 32-52, and shoes go up to size EU 48.
For the opening, Ganni Madison Avenue will offer customers who purchase a Bou bag in-store complimentary embossing of their initials for a personalized touch, and will host complimentary personal shopping appointments throughout the weekend. Bookings can be made via the Ganni store locator on Ganni.com.
The store’s design is a blend of its Danish heritage and its commitment to sustainability through such features as recycled rubber and plastic waste. She said that in every decision that they made for the store, sustainability was part of the checklist they had. In fact, the sustainability commitment has been essential to all the stores they have designed. “What’s different is our concept is evolving, and we have slightly different bespoke furniture,” she said. In addition, the artwork is slightly different. They are working with a female artist who is very key to the house.
She anticipates that handbags will be bestsellers at the Madison Avenue store. In this store, the handbag display will be larger than they have had in other stores. “We really hope that given the proper space and the visibility to our handbags, they will be a point of focus in the store,” the CEO said.
Handbags retail from $250 to $575. “It’s still evolving a lot,” she said. During the Paris show, they showed a new offer, with more to come.
She also anticipates strong ready-to-wear sales. “We believe our ready-to-wear offer will be quite appealing to our client,” she said. The ready-to-wear retails from $150 to $825. The sweet spot is between $300 and $500. “The journey we are on now is really to work on the quality of our product,” she said.
Ganni currently does a robust wholesale business in stores such as Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus and Bloomingdale’s. “Our wholesale business is still important in the U.S. Our business in DTC is bigger than it is now in wholesale,” she said.
In the U.S., roughly 56 percent of Ganni’s business is direct-to-consumer and 44 percent is wholesale. That is a percentage she is happy with. “The U.S. is a very wide market, but there is potential for us to be present in key and strong wholesale accounts. I think it is a good balance,” she said.
“Our wholesale business is doing very well, and our previous market was very successful,” she said. She said their wholesale accounts were very pleased with their show in Paris. “It was a platform for us to be able to be more visible — Paris obviously being a very strong platform for fashion brands.” She said they would show again in Paris.
At the new Madison Avenue store, she would love accessories (bags, shoes and small leather goods) to account for 35-40 percent of the business. At Ganni worldwide, accessories account for 30 percent of the business and ready-to-wear is 70 percent. She believes that with the potential and growth they’re seeing in their handbags in the past years, 35-40 percent in accessories is “really achievable” at the store. “Our shoe business is really strong,” said du Rusquec.
The company was really built for ready-to-wear, but the client expects more from the accessories, du Rusquec said. Ganni phased out the use of virgin leather across both RTW and accessories in 2023, driven by its ambition to reduce its carbon footprint by 50 percent by 2027, compared to a 2021 baseline. Today, the brand offers a variety of products across shoes, bags and RTW, made with a mix of recycled leather and next-generation alternatives derived from bio-based materials, such as olive oil waste and fruit waste bacteria.
Owners Nicolaj Reffstrup and his wife Ditte Reffstrup, creative director, bought Ganni from Frans Truelsen in 2009. Truelsen founded Ganni in Copenhagen in 2000 as a cashmere apparel label. While the brand’s headquarters remain in Copenhagen, they have offices in offices in New York, Shanghai and Paris.
At the present time, Ganni is not contemplating any new categories, and du Rusquec said it’s more about consolidating the categories they have and making sure they strengthen their offer in accessories, while maintaining their strong presence in ready-to-wear.
In the U.S., New York is the largest market, followed by California, where there are also five stores.
While du Rusquec has an internal projection for the Madison Avenue store’s first-year volume, she declined to reveal that figure. Internationally, they look to enter the Italian market next year, as well as the Japanese market.
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