The Girls' Club
By Lauren DeCarlo
NEW YORK — Richie Rich and Traver Rains, founders and designers of Heatherette, are channeling their inner 13-year-old girl.
The grown-up club kids will launch a juniors collection this fall at 75 Federated stores across the U.S., in addition to 25 specialty stores such as Nordstrom, Kitson in Los Angeles and Leo in South Beach, Fla., before extending to doors in Canada and Australia. To cap it off, a 707-square-foot Heatherette shop — complete with swinging chandeliers and a piano key floor — will open at Macy's Herald Square here in August.
Rich said he and Rains still think of Heatherette as their “baby,” though now, “she's going through the seventh grade.”
“She's a schoolgirl, dressed in her cute plaid skirt,” Rich said of his young contemporary consumer. “But,” he added, “she has that [outfit] in her backpack that her mom doesn't know about. And she has her cigarettes. ”
A large part of the collection, to be called Heatherette (the main line now will be known as Heatherette by Rich and Rains) will retail for less than $100. It includes on-trend pieces such as puffy jackets, tunic and polo tops and denim skirts in sizes 0-16. More expensive outerwear pieces, such as a leather jacket, will retail for $102. Tops will hover around the $16 wholesale mark and denim will range between $27 and $40 wholesale. The company declined to provide a wholesale projection for the first year.
Although a number of brands have shied away from the category in recent years out of fear that a lower price point would signify lesser quality, Rich thought now was a perfect time to enter the category, which he — and others —now refer to as “young contemporary.” A number of stores, not to mention customers, began asking him when they could expect a younger, lower-priced, commercial line. “Not a younger line in age, but rather in price point,” Rich clarified. Even the barista at his local Starbucks was wondering when and where she could find affordable Heatherette merchandise since the main collection retails between $350 and $1,200.
The goal from the beginning was to build a permanent junior collection. “We wanted to be able to have 10 deliveries per year because with one, you're just getting your toes wet. We wanted to think long-term.
“The more you're involved, the more you listen to people and you realize what the customer and the buyer wants,” he continued. “It's that Madonna theory: If you want to be revolutionary, you better mean it.”
But the launch of this collection wasn't without hesitation. Rich said Rains was concerned consumers would think they skimped on quality, but Rich quickly assuaged his fears. “I come from the world of growing up and shopping at the mall,” Rich said, noting that design-wise, the approach is entirely different. “When you look at the young contemporary brands, the fabrics they use are very different [from designer collections]. It's more jerseys and cotton. Our hoodies feel like they're made of cashmere, but they're not. They're acrylic.” "[It's] not a younger line in age, but rather in price point."
Richie Rich, Heatherette
Admittedly, Rich said he and Rains didn't have a true business plan mapped out when they launched the brand in 1999. In September 2004, however, the duo created Heatherette LLC when they partnered with Norman and Bruce Weisfeld, managing partners of the Weisfeld Group, which is also an investor in Fubu. Rich said he knew Norman “couldn't be that bad,” when he visited his office for an initial meeting and spied works by famed downtown artist Keith Haring hanging on the wall.
“We ventured out two-and-a-half years ago specifically to build a brand,” Rich said of his partnership with the Weisfeld Group. “We wanted to get the higher-end line in the store before we did the big commercial line.”
Heatherette launched at Henri Bendel here with a bang last August. The windows of the Fifth Avenue specialty store were designed by photographer David LaChapelle and featured odes to Heatherette muses Paris Hilton as well as Amanda Lepore, who sat in a window for two days applying lipstick at a mock boudoir.
“To the onlooker, Heatherette has always been a bit tongue-in-cheek or they'd say it's not wearable,” Rich said. “But we started in our studio apartment, then we saw our designs on Gwen Stefani in Us Weekly, then we saw our jeans featured in Vogue,” he said, noting the progression of the brand. “I was elated that our jeans were in Vogue and not some crazy concoction because that's what we wear every day. This is the evolution we've been going through.”
Rich and Rains said the infrastructure in place at the Weisfeld Group has allowed them the ability to manufacture this collection. “Doing a young contemporary collection is exciting, but we definitely are antsy about the idea of [a consumer] walking into a department store and not getting the whole concept,” Rich said. “But we recently met Tommy Hilfiger and our shop [in Federated] is next to his and he gave us the thumbs up.”
Rich and Rains dismissed the idea of licensing the new collection and opted to do it themselves. “The idea of licensing it was tossed around and people approached us, but we were never in this for financial gain,” Rich said. “We weren't going to slap the Heatherette name on some line. Our friends still have to love it. Traver and I aren't sitting on the beach on St. Barth's. We go to work every day.”
Perhaps this is just the start for Heatherette. This July, Rich said he'd like to have a runway show devoted solely to the juniors line, followed by the runway show during fashion week here in September that will showcase Heatherette by Rich and Rains. He also said that within the year he'd like to launch lingerie, cosmetics, shoes and handbag collections. Then the focus shifts to Tokyo, as that's where the first Heatherette store is slated to open by the end of this year. “They have such a great eye and no fear over there. They really embrace Heatherette,” said Rich.
But for now, Rich is focusing on the juniors line.
“Our customers are not all models on the runway,” Rich said. “It's fun dabbling in reality.”
I wanna puke on her size 11s GAG!
