Rihanna’s Savage x Fenty Reveals Plans to Open Six More Brick-and-mortar Stores
Rihanna’s Savage x Fenty retail fleet is getting bigger.
On Wednesday, the men’s and women’s lingerie and innerwear brand revealed six new brick-and-mortar locations coming soon, including Chicago; Long Island, N.Y.; Atlanta; Detroit; St. Louis, and Newark, Del.
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“The six new brick-and-mortar stores follow the success of retail openings in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Houston, Philadelphia and [the] Washington D.C.-metro area,” the company said in a statement. “The direct-to-consumer experience connects the energy of the brand’s highly engaged e-commerce site and social community to a vibrant space to discover, shop and interact with Savage x Fenty.”
In January, the digital lingerie brand — which was cofounded in 2018 by Rihanna and TechStyles Fashion Group (the same firm that launched Kate Hudson’s Fabletics) — opened its first brick-and-mortar store in Las Vegas. Since then, stores have opened in the Los Angeles area, Houston and Washington, D.C., with plans for a fifth in Philadelphia.
In February, WWD broke the news exclusively that Savage x Fenty was planning to open a flagship in west Brooklyn, N.Y.’s Triangle Building near the Barclays Center.
Savage x Fenty wouldn’t respond to questions, regarding when the stores would open. But Christiane Pendarvis, co-president and chief merchandise officer at Savage, said during January’s ICR 2022 virtual retail conference that: “Retail will give us the opportunity to better serve our current members, as well as acquire new customers. We’re taking our approach and leveraging the data that we have to build a competitive advantage with our model. So we were able to pick locations where we have a high density of existing VIPs and make sure that we have the appropriate foot traffic really to drive the top-line revenue of each new location.”
In addition to being able to touch and feel products, current stores help increase brand awareness. That’s because they’re tailor-made for Instagram, with things like mannequin walls and floor-to-ceiling images of the pop star.
Some shoppers were even delighted to meet the larger-than-life megastar in person during February’s Super Bowl weekend, when Rihanna, along with rapper and record producer boyfriend A$AP Rocky, surprised fans by making an unannounced appearance at the Culver City, Calif. store opening.
Meanwhile, the size-inclusive lingerie brand continues to gain traction, thanks in part to Rihanna’s star power, the brand’s promise to deliver an innerwear brand for all body types and lots of investor attention.
In January, it was revealed that Savage — which spun off of TechStyle to become a stand-alone firm at the end of 2019 — had secured an additional $125 million. The latest round, led by investment firm Neuberger Berman, comes on top of the $115 million Series B round Savage secured in early 2021, bringing the lingerie start-up’s total funding to around $310 million.
