No More Speedo Stores

The Warnaco Group (New York) has said it will close its remaining Speedo stores and increase outsourcing of manufacturing in a new round of restructuring.

The apparel manufacturer and retailer, whose portfolio of owned and licensed brand names includes Calvin Klein, Speedo and Nautica, said it expects to book pretax charges of $18-$26 million for the plan.

The company, which emerged from bankruptcy protection in February, said it expects to save more than $5 million a year as a result of the moves.

In addition, Warnaco said it agreed to sell its White Stag trademark to Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (Bentonville, Ark.), which has held exclusive rights to the name since 1993. The company said it will continue to design the White Stag women's sportswear line at Wal-Mart's expense through 2006.

Although it will close its remaining 44 Speedo retail stores, the company will continue to operate an online retail arm for the brand. Speedo retail stores account for less than 5 percent of overall sales of Warnaco's swimwear group. The company will focus on the wholesale sector, which it said saw growth of nearly 20 percent for the first nine months of the year.

Warnaco expects to close the stores from January to April and then convert some of the spaces to Calvin Klein underwear stores.