Topshop resumes US expansion plans

Thursday, 31 August 2006

Following the settlement of a suit over the name Topshop, the British
retailer is resuming its expansion plans in that country. Last month,
New York-based women's apparel company Nevada Apparel Corp sued parent
company Arcadia Group. The company claimed it owned the name in the US .
The group managed to settle the litigation for an undisclosed amount,
with Nevada transferring all its rights to the British group. The court
has approved the settlement. "We are now in control of the brand," Green
told WWD. "But what this litigation did was to reveal the vast amount of
interest from all sectors in Topshop coming to America ." Topshop had
been planning to open a US store, most likely in New York , next spring.
It would follow up with more store openings in the US . However,
although Green had said in June that a potential site had been found for
the store, which was to cover 60,000 to 90,000 square feet, the search
for a new start will have to be restarted. "We are still at the
inception stage of the search, so at this time there is no news on
developments," said a presswoman for Topshop. Green said that he opens
to open a store in the US within the next year, but is not yet sure if
it will be in New York or another city. "There are points for and
against," he said. " New York has an element of safety but some
experienced US retailers tell me it isn't a good proving ground for the
rest of the US . But what we have received over the last few weeks is
significant interest from major US retailers in partnering with us in
the US . We are thinking that they could take a 10 to 20 percent
interest in the American operation and help us with such things as
staffing and logistics and we are prepared to discuss that."

Karsten confirmed that there are plans to launch a new platform for the
Topshop website. According to Green, the new version will allow overseas
customers to buy from the site as well and should go live before
Christmas. More will become known about this in the coming weeks.