Deb Shops was a specialty retail

chain store A chain store or retail chain is a retail outlet in which several locations share a brand, central management and standardized business practices. They have come to dominate the retail and dining markets and many service categories, in many pa ...

and catalog in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

, selling women's clothing and accessories under its own private labels, as well as other labels, then exclusively an online retailer. The company was based in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

and principally served junior and plus-sized women in their early teens through their late twenties. At its peak Deb Shops operated 337 stores across 42 states. Following two bankruptcies in 2015, it became an exclusively plus-size online store.

History

The company was founded by Philip Rounick and Aaron Weiner, who opened their first store under the name JOY Hosiery in Philadelphia in 1932. JOY Hosiery initially sold reasonably priced hosiery, lingerie, and foundations in a wide variety of styles. In 1939, newly available nylon stockings were added to its inventory. The company expanded in the Philadelphia area in the 1950s. The company co-founder Philip Rounick's son, Marvin Rounick, became more involved in the management of the company after joining in 1961. Co-founder Aaron Weiner's son, Warren Weiner, followed suit in 1965. During this time the company observed the new phenomenon of suburban growth and construction of shopping malls. They decided to open stores in several locations, make the stores larger, and offer more merchandise. In the 1970s, Marvin Rounick and Warren Weiner closed most of the neighborhood stores and focused on opening larger stores in

shopping mall A shopping mall (or simply mall) is a North American term for a large indoor shopping center, usually anchored by department stores. The term "mall" originally meant a pedestrian promenade with shops along it (that is, the term was used to refe ...

s. The chain was renamed to Deb Shops and re-focused on women's and girls' clothing. Deb Shops acquired Atlantic Book Stores in 1995. In 1998, it operated 18 Atlantic book outlets, includiung 12 largely seasonally operated small Atlantic Book Shops in Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey resort towns, along with six larger Atlantic Book Warehouses carrying a full line of book titles and magazines, and reported combined retail sales of $205.1 million. The company was listed on the NASDAQ Exchange under the ticker symbol DEBS. However it was removed from the exchange after being acquired in 2007 by the investment firm of

Lee Equity Partners Lee Equity Partners is an American private equity firm focused on growth capital investments in middle-market companies across a range of industries. The firm, which is based in New York City, was founded in 2006 by Thomas H. Lee, the notable p ...

for $395 million, or $28.45 per share. The company parent DSI Holdings filed for bankruptcy on June 27, 2011. They filed for bankruptcy again on December 4, 2014. On January 7, 2015, they announced that they would close all 295 stores. The final sales happened on March 30, 2015. By September 2015 the company returned as an online-only retailer selling

plus-size clothing Plus-size clothing is clothing proportioned specifically for people above the average clothing size. The application of the term varies from country to country, and according to which industry the person is involved in. According to ''PLUS Model ...

. They shut down their website at the end of 2018 in December without warning. The last posts from the company's social media were about sales in November and December of 2015. Following the dissolution of Deb Shops, a separate, Israeli-owned, US-incorporated company, ASBS Holdings Inc., published a plus-size online store under the same name, with the addition of a hyphen in its website name and url, using the tagline, "Your Plus Size There".

References

{{reflist Clothing retailers of the United States Companies based in Philadelphia Clothing companies established in 1932 Retail companies established in 1932 Retail companies disestablished in 2015 Clothing companies established in 2015 Retail companies established in 2015 2015 disestablishments in Pennsylvania Re-established companies Clothing_companies_disestablished_in_2015 1932 establishments in Pennsylvania 2018 disestablishments in Pennsylvania 2015 establishments in Pennsylvania Defunct clothing retailers of the United States Companies that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2011 Companies that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2014