Youth retailer General Pants Co. is expanding to the US, opening its first concept store in West Hollywood this June.
As exclusively revealed in the May edition of Ragtrader, General Pants' design director Pip Edwards has also confirmed that a second US store is headed for New York later this year.
“The Local” by General Pants Co. will exclusively showcase Australian brands including Ksubi, Insight, One Teaspoon, Zanerobe, Neuw, Rolla's, The People Vs, Arvust, Spencer Project, Standard and Alice In the Eve.
The company will also operate a wholesale office and showrooms to further bolster its debut into the US market.
General Pants Co. CEO Craig King believes that in terms of global expansion, it's time to strike while the iron is hot.
“With 53 stores in Australia, 13 David Jones concessions and a strong online business, there are limits to how much further we can grow domestically.
“There are 3.8 million 18-30 year olds in all of Australia but 2.2 million in LA county alone.
“LA was an obvious choice for “The Local” based on the sheer volume of consumers within our target demographic and those that lead similar lifestyles to existing General Pants Co. customers at home.
“With a number of great Australian designers in high demand in America we thought it was time for a multi brand concept to break in.
“Multi brand retail is nothing new in the States, but we feel there’s room to cut out a niche by keeping the brand mix tight and purely Australian.”