American Apparel - Fashion Company Profile
American Apparel is a basics brand - T-shirts, hoodies, bodysuits and underwear - that today sells online as a brand of Gildan Activewear. The original American Apparel company, founded by Dov Charney in Los Angeles in 1989 and famous for its vertically integrated, made-in-Los-Angeles factories, went through bankruptcies in 2015 and 2016; Gildan bought the brand in 2017 and closed its stores, relaunching the name online. Charney's separate successor company is Los Angeles Apparel, which is a different business.
Company Snapshot
- Status
- Operating as an online brand owned by Gildan Activewear; the original company and its stores closed in 2017
- Listing
- Brand of Gildan Activewear, public - NYSE/TSX (GIL)
- Headquarters
- The brand was founded and based in Los Angeles, California
- Founded
- 1989
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Company Profile
Shoppers should therefore read the famous parts of the American Apparel story - the downtown Los Angeles factory, the 'Made in USA' positioning and the provocative advertising - as the history of the original company, kept in full on the history page linked below. The current brand sells a narrower basics range online and through wholesale channels under Gildan's ownership.
The April 2011 summary gives the formal shape: American Apparel is a vertically integrated manufacturer, distributor and retailer, based in downtown Los Angeles, California, employing approximately 10,000 people globally (about 5,000 in LA) at that time. The 2015-2016 wholesale catalog linked from this page is a PDF asset, not a page; the catalog link is in this page(?:'|')s links so the asset remains reachable.
American Apparel History
The earlier record for this company - its history, past brand line-ups, figures and photographs from the periods described - is kept on a separate page for historical reference.
American Apparel History & Historical Profile →Common Questions
What does vertically integrated mean in this profile?
Knitting, dyeing, sewing, photography, marketing, distribution and design all happened in the company's Los Angeles facilities, minimizing sub-contractors and offshore labor, in the historical record.
When did American Apparel emerge from Chapter 11?
On February 5, 2016 it announced it had emerged as a private company, under a plan approved by the Delaware bankruptcy court on January 27, 2016.
What happened to founder Dov Charney, per the record?
The board voted on June 18, 2014 to replace him as Chairman and terminate him as President and CEO for cause, and the company announced his termination on December 17, 2014.
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