Men May Be From Mars, But Who's Dressing Them?

Gadzooks Inc. (Carrollton, Texas) has announced that it is getting out of the menswear business and will be converting all of its 425 Gadzooks stores and four Orchid stores to an all-female assortment early in the second half of 2003.

The operator of mall-based specialty stores of casual clothing and accessories reported that sales for the four weeks of fiscal May ended May 31, 2003, increased 4.4 percent and May same-store sales increased 5.1 percent. (A year earlier, the retailer had experienced a 1.2 percent same-store sales decrease for May.)

For the first 17 weeks of fiscal 2003, however, total sales decreased 6.5 percent and same-store sales declined 7.1.

While Gadzooks didn't elaborate on the strategy behind the change, a report in The New York Times suggested that retailers are making similar decisions throughout the menswear business.

Mitchell's of Greenwich and Westport, Conn., one of the most well-known and exclusive menswear retailers in the New York area, will be shrinking its men's clothing space and expanding its women's department. As The Times noted, “Hermes purses at $4750 are shoving aside Tommy Bahama sport shirts.”

Last month, Target Stores (Minneapolis) said it would reduce the floor space for its men's collections, to make room for more food. The Times said that Target president Gregg Steinhafel predicted last month that “softer-than-average growth” in men's wear would continue nationally. The company will even downsize, slightly, the boys' section of the children's department.

Today's Man (Moorestown, N.J.), a 24-unit menswear chain in the Philadelphia, New York and Washington, D.C. markets, filed for bankruptcy protection in March. Casual Male Big & Tall (Needham, Mass.), which operates 480 Casual Male stores and more than 100 closeout and irregular outlets in more than 40 states, recently reported that first-quarter same-store sales were down 5 percent. And The Men's Wearhouse (Houston), which The Times described as “until recently a hard-driving exception,” reported a scant 1 percent first-quarter gain in same-store sales in the U.S. and an 8.7 percent decline in Canada. (The company operates about 690 stores in 44 states and Canada — about 500 Men's Wearhouse mostly strip mall-based stores, about 60 K&G Men's Center stores and five Suit Warehouse chain stores.)

Abercrombie & Fitch (Columbus, Ohio) announced that a drop in the men's business more than offset healthy sales of women's clothing, resulting in a 6 percent decline in same-store sales for the first quarter. Tommy Hilfiger (Hong Kong) reported that menswear sales last year dropped 11.7 percent. Executives of Nautica (New York) warned of the continued difficulty facing the men's collection for 2004. And Terry Lundgren, ceo of Federated Department Stores (Cincinnati), recently referred to selling men's clothes as “challenging” these days.