Aritzia last week unveiled its third Manhattan store, a two-level unit with more than 8,000 square feet of space, at 89 Fifth Avenue in the Flatiron District. The Canadian retailer in February will open a 6,000-square-foot store in Boston.
While Aritzia’s other New York units, on Fifth Avenue between 48th and 49th Streets and Broadway in SoHo, cater to tourists and a variety of New Yorkers, “the Flatiron store is more of a local destination,” said Oliver Walsh, chief marketing officer of Aritzia. “People who live and work there are true New Yorkers. Once we understood that we were resonating with New Yorkers, we wanted to be in that neighborhood. The size of our local customer base has, frankly, been a real surprise to us.”
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The new store combines a range of Aritzia’s homegrown brands with third-party labels such as Citizens of Humanity. Aritzia’s own brands, which it designs in-house, include Wilfred, Babaton and Community. “We have a mix of brands that we create and incubate.”
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The new Aritzia store replaces a Banana Republic unit in a 100-year-old building. The store feels modern due to the use of materials such as marble, bronze, European oak, mirrors and paintings by Andy Dixon throughout. A grand staircase leads to a lounge area.
The majority of the store’s assortment consists of Aritzia’s own brands with other labels comprising 20 percent of the mix.
“The richness of the product mix with the diversity of styles and functions combined with customer service” is Aritzia’s recipe for success, Walsh said.
Aritzia last year began opening freestanding stores in Canada for several of its brands, including Wifred and TNA. “Demand for two of our own brands led to their own stores in Canada,” Walsh said. “We’ll absolutely do that here [in the U.S.]. We haven’t made any firm decisions yet, but the brands will likely be Wilfred or Babaton.”
Walsh said there’s “significantly more room for Aritzia stores in Manhattan — absolutely. The U.S. is a huge focus for us now. We’re on a definite expansion mode.
“Europe is something we’re continually talking about,” he said. “We see demand in Europe based on our e-commerce traffic. We have no concrete timing, but it’s absolutely something on the midterm radar.”