For years, Irvine-based BB Dakota was a small maker of hip women’s clothes.
Enter nZania LLC.
Gloria Brandes, who started BB Dakota in the mid-1980s from her Laguna Beach home, licensed the brand to Irvine-based apparel company nZania in 2005 after having “percolated along” with no marketing and a two- to three-person sales force for 20 years.
She didn’t expect what came next.
“We were caught completely off guard when sales tripled the first year,” said Brandes, who declined to give specifics. “No one can figure out where we came from. It seems we just exploded on the scene. But we have been here all along just dozing.”
NZania, owned by apparel veteran Ivan Spiers, helped BB Dakota fine-tune its operations and took over sales, production and administration.
Brandes, whose husband is businessman and horse enthusiast Richard John “R.J.” Brandes, handles design.
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BB Dakota magazine ad: marketing efforts brought in “many new customers,” Brandes says |
NZania
NZania knows the retail ropes. It owns or licenses several other brands, including Black Flys, Blue Cult and Andy Warhol for Levi’s.
The low-profile Spiers used to be known for buying leftover, end-of-season clothes and selling them to discount stores for a profit. With nZania, he’s known as a savvy marketer who can revive struggling brands.
That was the case with Costa Mesa-based Fly Industries LLC, maker of Black Flys sunglasses. NZania took over inventory and shipping for the company a few years ago and helped lead a turnaround.
Through the years, Spiers has had a hand in various brands, including apparel maker Counter Culture, Joe Boxer, SixSixOne, a maker of cycling and motocross gear, R & S; Trading Co.’s Sugar Cosmetics and Mr. Rags, a defunct mall chain that sold boys clothes.
NZania has driven changes at BB Dakota.
First up: increasing the design and sales staff. In two years, BB Dakota went from 30 people to about 100, Brandes said.
The company learned to re-plenish hot selling clothes quickly, something it was challenged to do in the past, she said.
“If an item was hot, we’d be out of inventory,” Brandes said.
BB Dakota also saw new marketing, attended more trade shows and ran more ads in magazines, which brought in “many new customers,” she said.
The company now is hunting for more design and sales workers to help drive a new line of handbags and expand its clothes for young men, Brandes said.
BB Dakota, which mainly has focused on chic clothes for women ages 18 to 25, already offers some men’s shorts and coats.
“In many ways it is easier than the young contemporary women’s area because the field does not seem as crowded,” Brandes said of men’s clothes.
Plus, it helps that “men’s fashion changes more slowly,” she said.
BB Dakota has to fight to stand out in the cutthroat fashion market.
There’s lots of competition, including Philadelphia-based Urban Outfitters Inc.’s Free People brand and Miss Sixty women’s clothes from Italy’s Sixty SPA.
BB Dakota is getting a lot of buzz.
The clothes don’t “look flashy or overtly sexy” but catch attention with quality fabrics, “great color” and cool designs, Brandes said.
Think a short, red gingham pleated skirt with a cropped white jacket. A sleek black leather trench coat synched with a wide belt. Capri cargo pants with a faded camouflage print, or a fitted pinstriped vest paired with a ruffled white blouse.
Prices range from $24 for a graphic T-shirt to $250 for a leather coat.
BB Dakota sells in some 5,000 stores in the U.S. and Canada, including Nordstrom, Urban Outfitters and boutiques.
Orange County retailers include Local Color in Newport Beach and No Rest for Bridget in Costa Mesa.
BB Dakota also is sold on a small scale in Japan, Europe and Australia. Plans are to build sales abroad in the next year or so, Brandes said.
Retailers’ Take
The brand is “cutting edge,” said Jane Young, owner of Local Color.
“I’ve been in this business for 30 years and it’s the best line,” she said. “I hang it outside because people know it and they’ll stop in the store just to see it.”
Local Color picked up the brand two years ago and has upped its selection since, according to Young.
So has No Rest for Bridget. Owner Mas Hayakawa said he decided to test BB Dakota clothes last year.
“Everything sells out,” he said. “They have very unique styles at really good prices.”
The goal, according to Brandes, is to strike a balance: offer quality clothes that sell for reasonable prices.
BB Dakota isn’t a hobby for Brandes.
She learned the ropes of production and manufacturing while running her family’s coat business in Quebec.
Brandes said she and her brother took over the company in 1974 after her father, 57, suddenly died.
“I plunged with a vengeance into learning the design and production side of the business, which had been my father’s domain,” Brandes said. “I probably did so out of grief and the belief that somehow I was justifying all the hard work he had put into the company.”
Brandes said she was “fascinated” and “learned every aspect of production by being very hands-on in the factory for many years.”
At night, she studied design, pattern making and fine tailoring in Montreal.
The experience gave Brandes a “broader perspective on the design process” and helps her execute designs so “they look like the concept in the little bubble over my head,” she said.
OC Arrival
In 1984, she married R.J. Brandes and moved to OC.
R.J. Brandes made an initial fortune by selling Belgravia Capital Corp., a lender to mobile home park developers, to Finova Group Inc. in 1997, reportedly for $90 million.
At the same time, he sold another business, Belgravia Financial Services, to Ford Motor Credit Co. for an undisclosed sum.
These days, Brandes’ passion is the ponies,but not at the track. His Blenheim EquiSports of California runs the 80-acre Oaks Blenheim Rancho Mission Viejo Riding Park in San Juan Capistrano, which hosts equestrian events.
Soon after arriving in OC, Gloria Brandes said she started making coats here and expanded into sportswear. She said she started the business and came up with a way to fund it on her own. Going slow early on allowed her to take time to raise her kids.
“It feels pretty good to finally see things really take off after so many years of plodding along,” she said.
