Pepper Foster, co-founder and co-designer of premium denim brand Chip & Pepper, just returned home to Los Angeles after a trip to Istanbul where he was touring factories. That’s no wonder, since the company he runs with his twin brother, Chip, is expanding into sportswear.
Hitting stores for spring selling, the new Chip & Pepper sportswear adds to the company’s denim line, which sells in high-end specialty stores nationwide.
“I am really fired up about this,” Pepper Foster said. “We really wanted to expand the brand to include key items, so the sportswear does that for us.”
The new line is heavily influenced by the brothers’ California heritage, with seersucker Bermuda shorts, skinny cargo pants, woven tops, supersoft Eighties-inspired T-shirts and denim and jersey dresses seen throughout.
Available for both women and men, the Chip & Pepper sportswear collection wholesales from $20 to $60 and is targeted for the company’s existing retailers, such as Saks Fifth Avenue, Fred Segal, Bloomingdale’s and Neiman Marcus.
“Retailers have been asking us for a line like this for some time now,” Foster said. “We are really concentrating on keeping the line right, with limited distribution and great product, with that California sun-bleached look.”
Foster said he and his brother have no interest in licensing. In order to keep full control of what they produce, they would rather keep the line in-house, he said, adding that the collection’s anticipated first-year sales volume is $7 million to $10 million.