The Kooples Shifts Up a Gear in North America

PARIS — The Kooples is forging ahead with its U.S. expansion. The French contemporary brand is slated to open its fifth American boutique on SoHo’s Mercer Street on March 22, its second store in New York. Its first stand-alone Stateside opened last July in Los Angeles. That store was followed by boutiques in San Francisco, Santa Monica and New York City’s Meatpacking District. The brand launched in the U.S. via concessions in Bloomingdale’s stores a little more than two years ago. “We will finish this fiscal year, which ends Aug. 31, with sales of $28 million in the U.S. and Canada,” said chief executive officer Nicolas Dreyfus. “In the first half, we saw same-store sales growth in the U.S. of 9 percent, better than our objectives,” he said.“Meatpacking, in the first half, was in our top-three stores worldwide.” The brand is also performing better than expected in wholesale in the U.S., where it is now stocked at Saks Fifth Avenue and Nordstrom as well as specialty stores. “Wholesale will account for 20 percent of U.S. sales this year,” Dreyfus said. “Nordstrom, with the summer collection, to date has already sold 50 percent of stock, which is very rare.” All this is without advertising, which has played a

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