U.S. fashion giant Liz Claiborne Inc. said yesterday that it is buying Mexx Canada Inc., the privately owned licensee of Dutch clothier Mexx Group.
Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Montreal-based Mexx Canada runs 31 stores and 35 locations within department stores. Last year, it had sales of $83-million, and it expects that figure to rise to $100-million by the end of 2002. Mexx Canada employs about 800 people.
Mike Scarpa, Claiborne's chief financial officer, says that European arm is already responsible for designing and manufacturing roughly 80 per cent of Mexx Canada's products, which it then imports. "It was only a natural that we acquire that portion of the brand in Canada," he said during an interview from his office in New York.
Claiborne, which designs and markets 26 different brands -- including the DKNY and Kenneth Cole lines -- had sales last year of $3.4-billion (U.S.). It said it expects the Mexx Canada deal to add as much as 2 cents a share to its 2002 year-end earnings.
Shares of Claiborne closed down 1 cent to $31.01 on the New York Stock Exchange yesterday. They have a 52-week high of $32.45 and a yearlong low of $18.