Levi Strauss & Co.

Levi Strauss & Co.

Type	Private
Industry	Clothing
Founded	1853 (1853)
Founder	Levi Strauss
Headquarters	San Francisco, California, U.S.
Number of locations	2,800 company-operated stores[1]
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Chip Bergh (CEO);[2] Harmit Singh (CFO)[2]
Products	Jeans
Brands	Levi's, Dockers, Denizen, Signature by Levi Strauss & Co.
Revenue	$4.494 billion (2015)[3]
Operating income	$ 431 million[3]
Net income	$ 209 million (2015)[3]
Total assets	$3.13 billion (2013)[2]
Owner	Relatives of Levi Strauss
Number of employees	15,000 (2013)[2]
Website	www.levistrauss.com

Levi Strauss & Co. /ˌliːvaɪ ˈstraʊs/ is a privately owned American clothing company known worldwide for its Levi's /ˌliːvaɪz/ brand of denim jeans. It was founded in 1853 when Levi Strauss came from Buttenheim, Bavaria, to San Francisco, California to open a west coast branch of his brothers' New York dry goods business. The company's corporate headquarters is located in the Levi's Plaza in San Francisco.^[4]

History

Origin and formation (1853–1890s)

Levi Strauss started the business at the 90 Sacramento Street address in San Francisco. He next moved the location to 62 Sacramento Street then 63 & 65 Sacramento Street. Jacob Davis, a Latvian Jewish immigrant, was a Reno, Nevada ^[5] tailor who frequently purchased bolts of cloth made from denim from Levi Strauss & Co.'s wholesale house. After one of Davis' customers kept purchasing cloth to reinforce torn pants, he had an idea to use copper rivets to reinforce the points of strain, such as on the pocket corners and at the base of the button fly.^[6] Davis did not have the required money to purchase a patent, so he wrote to Strauss suggesting that they go into business together. After Levi accepted Jacob's offer, on May 20, 1873, the two men received U.S. Patent 139,121 from the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The patented rivet was later incorporated into the company's jean design and advertisements. Contrary to an advertising campaign suggesting that Levi Strauss sold his first jeans to gold miners during the California Gold Rush (which peaked in 1849), the manufacturing of denim overalls only began in the 1870s. The company created their first pair of Levis 501 Jeans in the 1890s, a style that went on to become the world's best-selling item of clothing.

Growth in popularity (1910s–1950s)

Levi Strauss advertising on a building in Woodland, California

Modern jeans began to appear in the 1920s, but sales were largely confined to the working people of the western United States, such as cowboys, lumberjacks, and railroad workers. Levi’s jeans apparently were first introduced to the East during the dude ranch craze of the 1930s, when vacationing Easterners returned home with tales (and usually examples) of the hard-wearing pants with rivets. Another boost came in World War II, when blue jeans were declared an essential commodity and were sold only to people engaged in defense work.

Between the 1950s and 1980s, Levi's jeans became popular among a wide range of youth subcultures, including greasers, mods, rockers, and hippies. Levi's popular shrink-to-fit 501s were sold in a unique sizing arrangement; the indicated size referred to the size of the jeans prior to shrinking, and the shrinkage was substantial. The company still produces these unshrunk, uniquely sized jeans, and they are still Levi's number one selling product. Although popular lore (abetted by company marketing) holds that the original design remains unaltered, this is not the case: the crotch rivet and waist cinch were removed during World War II to conform to War Production Board requirements to conserve metal, and was not replaced after the war. Additionally, the back pocket rivets, which had been covered in denim since 1937, were removed completely in the 1950s due to complaints they scratched furniture.^[7] From a company with fifteen salespeople, two plants, and almost no business east of the Mississippi in 1946, the organization grew in thirty years to include a sales force of more than 22,000, with 50 plants and offices in 35 countries.^[8]

Blue jeans era (1960s–1980s)

A pair of Levi's 501 raw jeans

From the early 1960s through the mid-1970s, Levi Strauss experienced significant growth in its business as the more casual look of the 1960s and 1970s ushered in the "blue jeans craze" and served as a catalyst for the brand. Levi's, under the leadership of Walter Haas, Peter Haas Sr., Paul Glasco and George P. Simpkins Sr., expanded the firm's clothing line by adding new fashions and models, including stone-washed jeans through the acquisition of Great Western Garment Co. (GWG), a Canadian clothing manufacturer acquired by Levi's. The acquisition lead to the introduction of the modern "stone washing" technique, still in use by Levi Strauss. Simpkins is credited with the company's record-paced expansion of its manufacturing capacity from 16 plants to more than 63 plants in the United States from 1964 to 1974 and 23 overseas. Levi's' expansion under Simpkins was accomplished without a single unionized employee as a result of Levi's' and the Haas family's strong stance on human rights and Simpkins' use of "pay for performance" manufacturing from the sewing machine operator level up. As a result, Levi's' plants were perhaps the highest performing, best organized and cleanest textile facilities of their time.

The Dockers brand, launched in 1986 and which is sold largely through department store chains, helped the company grow through the mid-1990s, as denim sales began to fade. Dockers were introduced into Europe in 1996 and led by CEO Jorge Bardina. Levi Strauss attempted to sell the Dockers division in 2004 to relieve part of the company's $2.6 billion outstanding debt.

Brand competition (1990s)

Levi's 506 inside

By the 1990 Levi's faced competition from other brands and cheaper products from overseas, and began accelerating the pace of its US factory-closures and its use of offshore subcontracting agreements. In 1991 Levi Strauss became implicated in a scandal involving pants made in the Northern Mariana Islands: some 3% of Levi's jeans sold annually with the Made in the USA label were shown to have been made by Chinese laborers under what the United States Department of Labor called "slavelike" conditions. As of 2016 most Levi's jeans are made outside the US, though a few of the higher-end, more expensive styles are still made in the U.S.

Cited for sub-minimum wages, seven-day work weeks with 12-hour shifts, poor living conditions and other indignities, Tan Holdings Corporation, Levi Strauss' Marianas subcontractor, paid what were then the largest fines in U.S. labor history, distributing more than $9 million in restitution to some 1,200 employees.^[9][10][11] Levi Strauss claimed no knowledge of the offenses, then severed ties to the Tan family and instituted labor reforms and inspection practices in its offshore facilities.

The activist group Fuerza Unida (United Force) formed following the January 1990 closure of a plant in San Antonio, Texas, in which 1,150 seamstresses, some of whom had worked for Levi Strauss for decades, saw their jobs exported to Costa Rica.^[12] During the mid- and late-1990s, Fuerza Unida picketed the Levi Strauss headquarters in San Francisco and staged hunger strikes and sit-ins in protest at the company's labor policies.^[13][14][15]

The company took on multibillion-dollar debt in February 1996 to help finance a series of leveraged stock buyouts among family members. Shares in Levi Strauss stock are not publicly traded; the firm as of 2016 is owned almost entirely by indirect descendants and collateral relatives of Levi Strauss, whose four nephews inherited the San Francisco dry-goods firm after their uncle's death in 1902.^[16] The corporation's bonds are traded publicly, as are shares of the company's Japanese affiliate, Levi Strauss Japan K.K.

In June 1996 the company offered to pay its workers an unusual dividend of up to $750 million in six years' time, having halted an employee-stock plan at the time of the internal family buyout. However, the company failed to make cash-flow targets, and no worker dividends were paid.^[17]

Recent developments (2000–present)

A Levi's outlet store in Canada

In 2002 Levi Strauss began a close business collaboration with Walmart, producing a special line of "Signature" jeans and other clothes for exclusive sale in Walmart stores until 2006.^[18] Levi Strauss leads the apparel industry in trademark infringement cases, filing nearly 100 lawsuits against competitors since 2001.^[19] Most cases center on the alleged imitation of Levi's back pocket double arc stitching pattern (U.S. trademark #1,139,254), which Levi filed for trademark in 1978.^[20] Levi's has successfully sued Guess?, Polo Ralph Lauren, Esprit Holdings, Zegna, Zumiez and Lucky Brand Jeans, among other companies.^[19]

In 2002 the company closed its Valencia Street plant in San Francisco, which had opened the same year of the city's April 1906 earthquake.^[21][22] By the end of 2003, the closure of Levi's last U.S. factory in San Antonio ended 150 years of jeans made in the USA. Production of a few higher-end, more expensive styles of jeans resumed in the US several years later.^[22]

By 2007 Levi Strauss was again said to be profitable after declining sales in nine of the previous ten years.^[23] Its total annual sales, of just over $4 billion, were $3 billion less than during its peak performance^[22] in the mid-1990s.^[24] After more than two decades of family ownership, rumors of a possible public stock offering were floated in the media in July 2007.^[25] In 2009 it was noted in the media for selling jeans on interest-free credit, due to the global recession.^[26][27] In 2010 the company partnered with Filson, an outdoor-goods manufacturer in Seattle, to produce a high-end line of jackets and workwear.^[28]

On May 8, 2013, the NFL's San Francisco 49ers announced that Levi Strauss & Co. had purchased the naming rights to their new stadium in Santa Clara, California. The naming-rights deal called for Levi's to pay $220.3 million to the city of Santa Clara and to the 49ers over twenty years, with an option to extend the deal for another five years for around $75 million.^[29] As of 2016 Levi Strauss Signature jeans sell at several stores in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan and Japan.

Cultural impact

Levi's has been worn by people from all walks of life, from miners to award NobelPrize winners including Albert Einstein himself, whose famous Leather Jacket was made by Levi Strauss & Co in the 30's and has recently been sold at auction house Christies for £110,500.^[30]

Corporate structure and staff

Levi's Plaza, corporate headquarters

Levi Strauss & Co. is a worldwide corporation organized into three geographic divisions: Levi Strauss Americas (LSA), headquartered in San Francisco; Levi Strauss Europe (LSE), based in Brussels; and Levi Strauss Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa (LSAMA), based in Singapore. The company employs a staff of approximately 16,000 people worldwide.

Current products

Products include jeans, trousers, shorts, shirts, jackets, sweaters, sweatshirts, T-shirts, underwear,socks, accessories, shoes, dresses, skirts, belts, overalls, jumpsuits and a "big and tall" range. Jeans are categorised by fit as: skinny, slim, straight, bootcut, taper, relaxed, flare and big & tall. Most of the adult denim jeans are identifiable by trademarked three digit style numbers. 501s are available in styles for both men and women, the rest of the 500 series are marketed for men and the 300, 400, 700 and 800 series for women, with the exception of 751s which are classic straight zip fly jeans.^[31]

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  Tag from a pair of Levi 501 button fly jeans

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  Detail of the back of a pair of Levi's 501 jeans

Advertising

Levi's marketing has often made use of old recordings of popular music in television commercials, ranging from traditional pop to punk rock. Notable examples include Ben E King ("Stand By Me"), Percy Sledge ("When a Man Loves a Woman"), Eddie Cochran ("C'mon Everybody!"), The Ronettes ("Be My Baby"), Marc Bolan ("20th Century Boy"), Screamin' Jay Hawkins ("Heart Attack & Vine"), The Clash ("Should I Stay or Should I Go?").

Many of these songs were re-released by their record labels as a tie-in with the ad campaigns, resulting in increased popularity and sales of the recordings and the creation of iconic visual associations with the music, such as the use of a topless male model wearing jeans underwater in the 1986 adverts featuring "Wonderful World" and "Mad about the Boy" and the puppet, Flat Eric, in the ads featuring music by Mr. Oizo.

See also

• List of fashion designers
• List of companies of the United States

References

Further reading

• Ford, Carin T. (April 2004). Levi Strauss: The Man Behind Blue Jeans (Famous Inventors). Enslow Publishers. ISBN 0-7660-2249-8. 
• Roth, Art. The Levi's story. 
• Van Steenwyk (June 1988). Levi Strauss: The Blue Jeans Man. Walker & Company. ISBN 0-8027-6795-8. 
• Ed Cray (1978). Levi's: The Shrink to Fit business that stretched to cover the world. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 0-395-26477-4. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Levi Strauss & Co..

• Levi's
• Corporate site
• Levi's India
• Levi Strauss Signature
• Levi's Sponsorship of Project Runway