COSTA MESA, Calif. — Paul Frank Industries, the youthful apparel and merchandise phenom founded on the grinning mug of a sock monkey, is growing up and out — even as its co-founder and namesake has stepped aside.
This week at MAGIC in Las Vegas the company is launching the character-driven Julius & Friends brand and presenting a contemporary-skewed Paul Frank label. The reconfigured company brands, which include the Small Paul offshoot for children, are being showcased under one roof, literally, a modernist post-and-beam home inside the Las Vegas Convention Center.
“To say there’s lots of stuff going on right now is an understatement,” said Ryan Heuser, co-founder and president.
There are 16 Paul Frank stores worldwide. Doors are slated to open this year in Dubai and Bahrain, with a second store opening in Doha, Qatar.
Total 2005 sales were more than $40 million, said co-founder and chief executive officer John Oswald, 39. Global sales account for 35 percent of volume. Oswald predicted 2006 sales would climb 20 percent.
Last year, after the 10th birthday of monkey mascot Julius, who Paul Frank himself created and began sewing onto vinyl wallets in 1995, the company announced Frank was leaving. He would remain a significant stakeholder in the privately held firm.
The split wasn’t a surprise to those familiar with the company. The 38-year-old artist-musician’s contribution always had been more as a guide in aesthetics, while Heuser and Oswald oversaw daily operations.
Heuser guided Frank — born Paul Sunich — from selling his crafts out of his duffel bag at a Huntington Beach, Calif., newsstand into a formal business. The former head of publicity for Mossimo, Heuser sunk his $7,000 savings into financing Frank’s first store orders in 1997, when the company was incorporated.
Oswald joined them not long after, with financing from the sale of his import company.
“Paul Frank, the company, has always been about what we do together as a team,” Oswald said. The “Industries” part of the brand name was added to connote a kind of Warholian Factory that can do anything.
And it has. The company has created collectibles in collaborations between the brand and Elvis Presley, John Deere, Hello Kitty and Andy Warhol.
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Julius and the other cute characters have appeared on album covers and bicycles, MP3 cases and underwear. A larger-than-life-sized Julius visits children’s hospitals and makes personal appearances at accounts such as Bloomingdale’s and Nordstrom.
This fall’s launch of Julius & Friends is in response to retailers’ requests for more character-starring merchandise, Heuser said.
At the same time, there was a need for contemporary product that embodied the company’s modernist sensibility — without the splattering of cute.
“Everyone knows who Julius and Paul Frank are at this point,” Heuser said. “It’s time to make the distinction and play on the contemporary level and have Julius as a brand stand on its own.”
The contemporary Paul Frank brand targets ages 18 to 30; Julius & Friends, tweens and teens, and Small Paul is sized 2T to 7. But outside of the sizing restriction of Small Paul, the other two are really loose guidelines.
“The parent who is buying Small Paul will probably buy something for themselves,” said Oswald. “Those customers who are young at heart, like myself, may also want to get a character shirt or accessory.”
The new Julius & Friends brand could become the core volume driver. The line wholesales from a $9.50 T-shirt to a $37 goose-cord bomber jacket.
To distinguish the contemporary Paul Frank collection, a variation on the corporate logo — a line drawing of a house and pine trees — has been streamlined. It is being positioned against labels such as Fred Perry, Penguin and Modern Amusement.
The collection boasts an emphasis on detail — overstitching, hidden button plackets and inside waistbands scrawled with the artwork of Thomas Campbell. But the street-wise preppiness of the Paul Frank fall collection comes competitively wholesale priced, from a $16 cami to a $73.50 wool coat.
The campaign, running in Nylon, Dwell, Anthem, among other alternative shelter and lifestyle titles, features models with a real lion and ostrich. It’s as much a nod to the company’s animal roots as it is a departure from the cartoon creatures to a more sophisticated look.
Greg Smith, a veteran of Quiksilver Silver Edition, Earl Jean and Paul Smith, was recently appointed design director of the Paul Frank brand. His stamp will be fully seen with the spring 2007 line.
Tracy Bunkoczy was named design director of Julius & Friends after her successful rollout of Small Paul. She will oversee both divisions.
And creative director Jeff Yokoyama will now fully focus on Generic Youth, which he founded with his teen daughter in 2004 and is now doing “double digits” said Oswald. It partnered with PFI last year.
With a South Africa distributor recently inked and stores there planned for 2007, as well as other parts abroad and here, PFI is on the brink of major expansion as it enters its second decade. And aggressive plans are under way to enter publishing and video games with Julius & Friends.
“It is a lot,” said Oswald. “But we’re trying to take it step by step and still have fun.”