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Shein Buys Missguided Brand From Britain’s Frasers

A woman leaves a pop-up store of Chinese fast-fashion retailer Shein in Paris, France, May 5, 2023. (Reuters)
A woman leaves a pop-up store of Chinese fast-fashion retailer Shein in Paris, France, May 5, 2023. (Reuters)
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Shein Buys Missguided Brand From Britain’s Frasers

A woman leaves a pop-up store of Chinese fast-fashion retailer Shein in Paris, France, May 5, 2023. (Reuters)
A woman leaves a pop-up store of Chinese fast-fashion retailer Shein in Paris, France, May 5, 2023. (Reuters)

Shein, the China-founded fast-fashion retailer, has bought the Missguided brand from Mike Ashley's Frasers Group, the e-commerce giant's first purchase of a British brand.

Frasers said on Monday, Shein will acquire the intellectual property and trademarks of Missguided, while Frasers will retain its real estate and employees which have now been integrated into Frasers' fashion division.

Financial details of the deal were not disclosed but Frasers said the transaction has enabled "exciting discussions" with Shein regarding opportunities for potential collaboration across its brand portfolio.

Frasers, formerly called Sports Direct, bought Missguided out of administration for 20 million pounds ($24.2 million) in June 2022.

"This move is particularly noteworthy because it marks Shein's first acquisition of a British brand, aligning well with its focus on the UK as one of its fastest-growing markets," Shore Capital analyst Eleonora Dani said.

It will bring the Missguided label to Shein's online platform, which serves about 150 million users.

Frasers also owns the "I Saw it First" and "Missy Empire" brands in women's online fashion.

Frasers CEO Michael Murray said retaining the combined Frasers fashion teams while rationalizing its portfolio in this space to focus on fewer brands made sense in the current climate.

"We are also excited about the ongoing discussions around further collaboration between Frasers Group and Shein," he said.

Shares in Frasers were up 1.4% in early trading.

Shein has moved its headquarters to Singapore but manufactures most of its products in China.

Reuters reported in July that Shein was working on a potential US initial public offering and had been in talks with the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq.

In August, Shein partnered with SPARC Group, a joint venture between Forever 21 owner Authentic Brands and mall operator Simon Property, as the online fashion retailer looked to expand its market reach in the United States.

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Fashion

Uniqlo’s Chief Says Fast Fashion Must Change with the Times

A woman walks past jumpers for sale at the latest flagship store to open by Fast Retailing clothing brand Uniqlo, in the Shinjuku district of central Tokyo on November 14, 2024. (AFP)
A woman walks past jumpers for sale at the latest flagship store to open by Fast Retailing clothing brand Uniqlo, in the Shinjuku district of central Tokyo on November 14, 2024. (AFP)
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Uniqlo’s Chief Says Fast Fashion Must Change with the Times

A woman walks past jumpers for sale at the latest flagship store to open by Fast Retailing clothing brand Uniqlo, in the Shinjuku district of central Tokyo on November 14, 2024. (AFP)
A woman walks past jumpers for sale at the latest flagship store to open by Fast Retailing clothing brand Uniqlo, in the Shinjuku district of central Tokyo on November 14, 2024. (AFP)

Forty years after its founding, Japanese clothing retailer Uniqlo has more than 2,500 stores worldwide. Sales at its parent company, Fast Retailing Co., recently topped 3 trillion yen ($20 billion) annually for the first time.

The name Uniqlo comes from joining the words for “unique” and “clothing.” The chain’s basic concept is “LifeWear,” or everyday clothing. Uniqlo parent Fast Retailing Co. Chief Executive Tadashi Yanai, ranked by Forbes as Japan’s richest man and estimated to be worth $48 billion, spoke recently to The Associated Press at the company’s Tokyo headquarters. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: What were the biggest challenges over the past 40 years?

A: Actually 40 years, upon reflection, went by so fast they feel more like three years. You know what they say in Japan: Time flies like an arrow. I started a regional business, then expanded nationwide.

When we became No. 2 or No. 3 in Japan’s casual wear, and being No. 1 was right within reach, we became a listed company in 1994. That was followed by our fleece boom, which doubled our revenue in one year to 400 billion yen ($2.6 billion).

I’d been thinking about going global when our revenue reached 300 billion yen ($2 billion) so we opened 50 stores in Great Britain, hoping to be a winner there just like we had conquered Japan.

Instead, we got totally knocked out.

We opened 21 outlets in a year and a half, but had to close 16 of them, leaving just five. We didn’t succeed as we had hoped. This is not an easy job. It’s very tough.

But these days, our sales are strongest in London, and also Paris. We made progress gradually.

Q: What are some of the sustainability and other key issues you have faced over the years?

A: We make clothes that last a long time. Not just clothes that last for one season.

The cashmere sweater I’m wearing today is $99. But please don’t say “cheap.” Please call it “reasonable.” We sell quality products at reasonable prices.

We’ve done various sustainability efforts, and we talk only about what we have really achieved.

Sustainability is crucial to our operations. And we’ve done just about everything — recycling, employing the disabled, support for refugees.

The prices may be cheaper at Wal-Mart, but our products offer real quality for the price. We take the greatest care and time, and involve a lot of people. Our rivals are more careless.

Q: What is behind Uniqlo’s success and what resonated with global buyers?

A: When we say Uniqlo is “made for all,” one might imagine products for the masses, like what’s at a Wal-Mart or a Target.

But what we mean is a high-quality product that appeals to all people, including the extremely rich, not only those with sophisticated taste and intelligence, but also people who don’t know that much about clothes, and the design is fine-tuned, the material fine quality, and sustainability concerns have been addressed.

We were first a retailer, then a manufacturer-cum-retailer. Now we are a digital consumer retailer. That is why we are successful. If we had stayed the same, then we can’t hope to succeed.

Being a digital consumer retail company means we utilize information at a high level to shape the way we do our work. We gain information about our customers, the workers at the store, the market, all that information.

Changing daily is the only way we can hope for stable growth. The world is changing every day.

Q: Are you confident you can keep it up another 40 years?

A: Of course. We’ve been preparing to reach 3 trillion yen ($20 billion) revenue all these years. And we are finally starting to be known. But we still have a long way to go.

We are just getting started, and we are going to keep growing. There is more potential for growth in Europe and the US, as well as China and India, given the 1.4 billion population in each country. Clothing is a necessity, so population size is key.