- Abercrombie & Fitch was founded as a store for outdoor gear in the late 1800s.
- It became hugely popular with 2000s teens until changing tastes and controversy led to a decline.
- The retailer has recently found a new cohort of fans: Gen Z shoppers.
If you were a teen in the 2000s, chances are you either shopped at Abercrombie & Fitch — or felt too excluded to set foot in the store.
The 130-year-old retailer may have gotten its start catering to fishing and hunting enthusiasts, but by the late 1990s, the brand bore little resemblance to its outdoorsy origins. Its dimly lit, heavily scented stores — known primarily for their shirtless male models and narrow range of sizes — presented a brand of cool that seemed off-limits to anyone who wasn’t thin, white, and well-off.
While Abercrombie may once have been the epitome of a certain form of cool, the brand fell on hard times in the 2010s due to a mix of changing public sentiment and numerous controversies and lawsuits, including one that went all the way to the Supreme Court.
In recent years, the brand has seen a resurgence in popularity thanks to a new, more inclusive image: it revamped its stores, expanded its size range, and made its pricing more approachable.
And these changes are paying off: In May, Abercrombie & Fitch reported the best first-quarter results in its history, sending its shares 24% higher immediately afterward.
Here’s how Abercrombie & Fitch rose to fame, almost lost it all, then mounted a comeback.
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