Mark Badgley and James Mischka and partner Titan Industries Inc. announced today that they purchased the rights to the Badgley Mischka trademark for $16 million in cash.
Apparel licensee MJCLK LLC is also a partner. Iconix Brand Group was the former rights owner (while Titan was a longtime partner on the footwear license).
“We have had a productive 11 years working with the Iconix team to build Badgley Mischka from its red-carpet origins to a full lifestyle luxury brand,” said Mark Badgley. “We are excited to manage our core product categories in-house and focus on the luxury aspect in both product and image.”
Added brand parter James Mischka, “We intend to capitalize on the strength of our women’s Couture and ready-to-wear collections and especially the success of the shoe collections, to further this partnership with Titan, a company with tremendous expertise in the luxury market,” he said. “The core values of Badgley Mischka have always been luxury and timeless glamour; buying the brand back in this partnership will provide the basis to develop these attributes in a modern and exciting manor.”
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Titan CEO Joe Ouaknine said that additional opportunities include future category launches.
“We can expand in different categories, such as home, for example,” he said. “We will also now have unrestricted possibilities for the footwear category.”
Iconix, which tapped retail-industry veteran John Haugh for its CEO post last month, has shouldered a wave of controversy over the past year. Its founder and former CEO Neil Cole abruptly exited the company in August 2015 while an ongoing probe by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission led the firm to restate several years of earnings just this past February.
In January, musician Pharrell Williams repurchased Iconix’s 50 percent stake in his BBC Ice Cream LLC business, signaling that some brands might be looking to distance themselves from the company. Iconix’s highly publicized challenges have also weighed on the firm’s stock. The company’s share price dropped to a 52-week low of $4.67 on Jan. 20, compared with a 52-week high of $37.29 in March 2015.
Titan also houses Zendaya’s line Daya, Gx by Gwen Stefani, L.A.M.B. and Charles Jourdan.
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