Cypress-based clothing maker Hybrid Apparel LLC is relocating a Tustin warehouse to a former Quiksilver Inc. screen printing site in Huntington Beach with plans to hire more than 200 people.
In December, the maker of T-shirts, hooded sweatshirts and other clothes plans to move into more than 177,000 square feet of space in Huntington Beach that used to be occupied by Quiksilver, a maker of surf-inspired clothes that has its headquarters nearby.
Hybrid is relocating operations from a 120,000-square-foot Tustin warehouse used to ship clothes to specialty retailers, department stores and discount chains such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
The company, which has contracted out for screen printing, plans to take on the work itself in Huntington Beach.
“We have some pretty big initiatives going on right now, which means having everything close to us and laid out better allows us to be more reactive,” said Jarrod Dogan, Hybrid’s chief executive.
Hybrid caters to Middle America with artsy T-shirts that sell from $10 to $20.
The company makes clothes under the Hybrid, Bitter Sweet, Cage Rage, Three Counts, Power of Art and other labels.
It also makes clothes for retailers and under license from companies such as World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. and Walt Disney Co.
Hybrid projects $200 million in sales this year, which would be up 40% from 2008.
The expansion comes as some of Orange County’s largest clothing companies have cut jobs and closed facilities amid the worst retail downturn in recent memory.
Quiksilver phased out screen printing for its Quiksilver, Roxy and DC Shoes brands last year, tapping contractors instead.
The company left its Huntington Beach screen printing operation and warehouse a year ago as part of its cost cutting efforts.
Hybrid plans to move 170 workers from Tustin to Huntington Beach and hire an additional 200 people, according to Dogan.
“We’re moving all of our distribution into there to centralize things,” he said. “We have a lot more product to move and need more people to move it.”
The company employs some 140 people at its Cypress headquarters.
Hybrid also runs a six-person design studio in San Diego and an office in Arkansas to manage its Wal-Mart business.
Wal-Mart is driving growth, Dogan said.
“A lot of our new business is driven by the retailers,” he said. “The business has really snowballed in the last few years into all these opportunities.”
The company plans to print T-shirts and other clothes in Huntington Beach under licensing deals with World Wrestling Entertainment, Wenner Media LLC’s Rolling Stone, Walt Disney, Dr. Seuss Enterprises LP and others.
NZania
The company has picked up business from the spring closure of Irvine’s nZania LLC, which also made clothes featuring licensed characters and images.
NZania shut down after a lender withdrew a credit line in the wake of the 2008 financial meltdown.
Hybrid picked up much of the nZania’s Disney work, Dogan said.
Competitors include Los Angeles-based Fortune Fashions Industries LLC and Commerce’s Giant Merchandising Inc.
The company’s clothes are designed in Cypress and produced at factories in Asia and other parts of the world.
Hybrid typically ships about 5 million shirts per month, he said.
About 40% of Hybrid’s business is making shirts for its own brands. Thirty percent comes from designing shirts for retailers. Licensed products make up the rest.
“World Wrestling Entertainment is about $20 million of business a year,” Dogan said.
Dogan grew up working for his father’s clothing company, MD International, in South Africa.
After college, Dogan was carjacked in South Africa and decided to move to the U.S.
“I came to this country with $2,000 and a tourist visa,” he said.
He moved to Los Angeles in 1996 and a year later started a T-shirt company called Mixology with the backing of a screen printing company in Los Angeles.
When Dogan hit a rough patch with his investors at Mixology, he sold his stake in the company in 2003 and started Hybrid with cofounder Jeff Cadwell, who then was a buyer for Ontario-based Anchor Blue Retail Group Inc.
The partners have funded the business.
“Everything I’ve ever made I’ve put back into this company,” Dogan said. “I’ve lost money in the stock market and lost money in my 401(k). The only money I haven’t lost is in Hybrid.”
