Before being named chief executive in March, Mandy West had already been steering a turnaround at St. John Knits, helping drive a 30% jump in e-commerce sales and expanding the luxury brand’s wholesale partnerships.
When St. John first recruited West, they said: “We want to get the brand back to where it was in the heyday,” she told the Business Journal.
“Well, I love a comeback.”
It’s been a rough two decades for St. John, which got its start more than 60 years ago and reached the height of American fashion when its dresses were worn by First Ladies. In 2004, it employed more than 5,000 people, including almost 3,000 in Irvine.
In 2022, St. John had a goal of reaching $200 million in annual sales by 2025; last year, its sales were half that amount.
St. John’s employee count in Orange County has fallen to 125, according to the Business Journal’s annual list of apparel makers.
From CCO to CEO
When she was promoted to chief commercial officer during a series of leadership changes last year, West said she didn’t think she’d eventually rise to the brand’s top job.
It was a fast ascent.
West first joined the Anaheim-based fashion house in late 2019 as vice president of retail with a resume that included roles at Tesla, Nike and Intermix. After three years, she was named senior vice president in retail.
Then, in 2025, St. John’s former chief executive, Andy Lew, was named head of the parent company, Lanvin Group. Around the same time, West was promoted to chief commercial officer and named to a newly formed executive committee overseeing the brand.
“It’s the longest company I’ve been with in my career,” she said. “At St. John’s, I’m always learning something new. I think Andy knew that as well.”
Because she didn’t join St. John as a higher-level executive, West said she’s been able to work with every division and learn about the entire organization.
“I think having acquired different teams over time has allowed me to really deeply understand how each channel works and how we can make them work more efficiently together,” she said.
Since becoming CEO, West has been designing a full recovery at St. John, driven by recent gains from its e-commerce and wholesale channels.
The 4 Brands
In 2017, Fosun International purchased a majority stake in the iconic brand and eventually added three other brands. Fosun changed its name to Lanvin Group, and when it went public via a reverse merger in 2022, it was valued at about $1 billion.
Since then, the shares of the Shanghai-based company have steadily declined from $10 each to its current $1.55 and a $217 million market cap (NYSE: LANV).
Lanvin’s total revenue declined 18% to 240 million euros, about $282 million (USD), last year. The company, in a March 17 statement, said 2025 was “a challenging global luxury market.”
For the past two years, St. John has struggled with sales growth, citing a broad slowdown in the luxury market. In 2024, sales fell 12% to 79 million euros, around $83 million (USD).
The performance improved in 2025, with revenue dropping only 1% to 78 million euros (which converts to $92 million USD as of Dec. 30) as St. John refocused on the U.S. market.
Even though sales declined in 2025, the business unit wasn’t as challenged as the others in the portfolio.
“Things that are working here at St John, I’ll share with (Lew), so that we can share with the other brands,” West said.
Pit Stop at Tesla
West got her start in fashion at Intermix, a women’s apparel firm in New York founded by brothers Khajak and Haro Keledjian. Although it started as a part-time role while she was getting her master’s degree, she ended up staying for over three years as a buyer, working directly with the co-founders until 2009.
After a few years of working at Lululemon, then as a sales manager for a Brazilian fitness brand called Track & Field, West moved to St. Louis to work at Nike. She had worked her way up to regional sales manager at the athletic apparel and shoe brand when Tesla approached her in 2017, looking to recruit people with no automotive experience.
“At that time, the company was not profitable yet,” West said. “They were looking for people who either had a tech background or a fashion, luxury, high-level customer experience.”
She moved to Northern California for the role.
“It was an incredible time at the company, because it was basically make-or-break to be profitable,” West said.
“I learned a completely different aspect of running a strategic business,” she said, adding that the agility she learned at Tesla came in handy by the time she joined St. John.
Building Up E-Commerce
When St. John offered West a job in 2019, she was excited to return to the fashion industry at a company that was planning a comeback. Then the pandemic hit, and those plans were put on hold.
At that time, St. John had a limited omnichannel platform and was mostly dependent on its physical boutiques and outlets, which were closed. As vice president of retail, West oversaw all brick-and-mortar stores and had to create another way for customers to shop.
She set up a “hidden” website, with login credentials, for all the outlet stores in the first year to allow sales to continue.
When she became senior VP in 2023, she also gained oversight of St. John’s wholesale and buying divisions. The missing piece for her, however, was still e-commerce.
West said she finally got her hands on that division when she was promoted to chief commercial officer.
“I’m a very quick learner,” she told Lew at the time, who questioned her lack of experience.
Previously, online traffic was not high, and the number of unique visitors was declining. Her first task was to rebuild the e-commerce team from scratch. West also hired a new marketing agency to better direct its paid media to target the right customers.
By the end of 2025, e-commerce sales were up 30% and year-to-date in 2026, the business is up 36%, according to West.
“Now we’re very focused on optimization,” she said. “We’re feeding that top of the funnel, but how do we make sure that our conversion does not fall off with that new audience?”
Seamless Shopping
In 2025, St. John outperformed its sister brands Sergio Rossi, Lanvin and Wolford, where sales fell 14% to 30%.
“St. John demonstrated strong resilience in the North American market, supported by its established customer base and product offering,” Lanvin said in a statement in March.
West credits St. John’s survival to the company’s discipline in managing expenses. When top-line challenges arise, West said she immediately looks at what costs the company can afford to cut.
Her turnaround objective is to enhance the company’s shopping experience across stores and online, providing customers with broader, seamless access to inventory.
“It’s really important for us to be agile and provide products no matter where someone is,” she said.
With e-commerce now contributing to top-line growth, West also considered investing in the wholesale business.
The company partnered with Nordstrom several years ago, distributing products to five stores until last year. West helped increase distribution to 32 stores.
“We own the inventory, but it is their team who is selling the product,” she said, which helps support St. John’s brick-and-mortar business.
Sales from Nordstrom were up 38% in 2025, according to West.
“It’s a very profitable channel for us that also allows more visibility onto the brand, because they have a lot higher traffic and eyes than we do in DTC,” she said, referring to direct-to-consumer sales.
Trailblazing Women
Mandy West said she has always strived to excel — from becoming a professional basketball player in Greece to training for Olympic qualification in running and now landing her first chief executive role at St. John Knits.
West is the second woman to be chief executive at St. John Knits, following in the footsteps of the founders’ daughter, Kelly Gray, who served as co-CEO for two years and as creative director as well.
West said that before she started as CEO, she flew out to meet with Kelly and her mother, Marie Gray, who co-founded St. John in 1962. Gray ended up dressing several First Ladies and even had her own dressing room at the White House for a time.
“They were so inspirational to women who were the trailblazers of a working woman with a career,” West said.
This August, St. John will announce its new creative director, who has been working on its mid-September collection, followed by a new brand collaboration.
“We are bringing in a very, very fresh perspective, but by leveraging the DNA and the heritage of the brand,” West said.
She also wants to go after the younger generation of fashion shoppers by creating multi-generational pieces.
“When we are working with our same very loyal client, we want her to have pieces now in her closet that her granddaughter or her daughter will want to steal,” West said.
