Vans’ new Brand President Michelle “Sun” Choe will soon offer a glimpse into a few of the projects she’s been working on to elevate the brand since joining the Costa Mesa-based retailer last July.
“We have a lot of pistons to fire on product, marketing, distribution, brand elevation and more, and we’re putting each one in place,” VF Chief Executive Bracken Darrell told investors during the company’s Jan. 29 third-quarter earnings call. “I couldn’t be more excited about the initial work done by Sun at Vans, and you’ll hear more about it directly from her in just a few weeks.”
“She is a real operator,” he added. “I feel very, very good about the decisions she’s made.”
Choe’s appointment is among several recent initiatives at VF Corp. (NYSE: VFC) to kickstart profitability and improve operations following significant sales declines since 2022.
Darrell spent much of last year rearranging both Vans and VF’s leadership team by hiring Choe and adding Paul Vogel as chief financial officer for VF Corp.
During the earnings call, Darrell said that strong progress has been made.
“The pace of VF’s transformation is on track as we deliver against our Reinvent priorities,” he said in a statement.
The Denver-based retail operator reported a 2% increase in revenue to $2.8 billion, compared to a 17% drop in third quarter revenue a year ago. This increase was spurred by “global strength” at two of its largest brands The North Face and Timberland, the company said.
Along with fixing VF’s performance in the U.S. market, optimizing cost structure and strengthening its balance sheet, “delivering a Vans turnaround” has been another priority in the plans to help the company.
Vans’ fiscal third quarter revenue fell 9% to $608 million, which VF said was another period of expected improvement versus an 11% decline in the second quarter.
Improvement plans at work include tightening up Vans’ product line-ups and marketing efforts.
“The actions taken last year to clean up our inventory are continuing to deliver benefits, especially, on profitability as we right-size the brand’s cost structure,” Vogel told investors during the earnings call.
Currently, newer shoes and apparel are outperforming some of Vans’ more established products. The newer Knu Skool footwear has been a major growth driver, according to VF.
“We won’t rely on just one style to build our business in the future, and we have momentum in our newest styles, both Hylane and Upland,” Darrell said. Former Vans executive Kevin Bailey has noted in the past that the retailer depended too much on its classics line.
To make room for the newer products, VF has also closed 14% of Vans stores and about 9% of the wholesale stores in the U.S. while adding a few new retail spots.
Dickies, Top Brand No. 4
Vans is among VF’s top four brands, which also include The North Face, Timberland and Dickies. The latter is set to relocate from Fort Worth to Vans’ Costa Mesa headquarters by May, impacting about 120 employees in Texas.
Founded in 1922, the workwear brand generated $618 million in revenue for the fiscal year ended March 2024 and makes up most of VF’s work product segment.
Former Gap executive, Chris Goble, will lead the move to Orange County as Dickies’ brand president.
Dickies reported revenue of $134 million for the fiscal third quarter, down 10% from a year ago. Darrell said it’s “a small business for us,” but it’s got “more potential there than, in some ways, may be any other brand we have.”
The move to Southern California is part of “the revitalization of the Dickies brand,” VF spokesperson Ashley McCormack told the Business Journal back in December.
