Designer Brands Inc. is an American company that sells

designer A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exp ...

and name brand

shoes A shoe is an item of footwear intended to protect and comfort the human foot. They are often worn with a sock. Shoes are also used as an item of decoration and fashion. The design of shoes has varied enormously through time and from culture t ...

and fashion accessories. It owns the Designer Shoe Warehouse (DSW) store chain, and operates over 500 stores in the United States and an

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the activity of electronically buying or selling of products on online services or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile commerce, electronic funds transfer, supply chain manag ...

website. The company also owns private-label footwear brands including Audrey Brooke, Kelly & Katie, Lulu Townsend, and Poppie Jones.

History

The company was founded in 1969 as Shonac Corporation, as the shoe licensee for

Value City Value City was an American discount department store chain with 113 locations. It was founded in 1917 by Ephraim Schottenstein, a travelling salesman in central Ohio. The store was an off-price retailer that sold clothing, jewelry, and home good ...

. In July 1991, the company opened its first store, which was in

Dublin, Ohio Dublin is a city in Franklin, Delaware and Union counties in the U.S. state of Ohio. The population was 49,328 in the 2020 census with a census estimate of 49,037 in 2019. Dublin is a suburb of Columbus. The city of Dublin hosts the yearly ...

. In 1998, the company was acquired by Value City. By 1999, the company had 48 stores. In December 2004, the company was acquired by Retail Ventures, an affiliate. In March 2005, the company experienced massive data theft, including customer data from 1.4 million credit card transactions. In June 2005, the company became a

public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange ( ...

via an

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investme ...

. In April 2008, the company launched its

website A website (also written as a web site) is a collection of web pages and related content that is identified by a common domain name and published on at least one web server. Examples of notable websites are Google, Facebook, Amazon, and W ...

. In 2011, the company acquired Retail Ventures, its largest shareholder. In 2014, the company acquired 44% of

Town Shoes Town Shoes Ltd. was a Canadian chain of shoe stores founded by Leonard Simpson in 1952. It had 30 locations across Canada. Timeline In 2014, DSW, Inc., now Designer Brands, Inc., acquired a 44% stake in Town Shoes. In May 2018, DSW purchased ...

, a chain of Canadian shoe stores, and entered into a licensing agreement for the DSW name. In February 2016, the company acquired Ebuys for $62.5 million. In July 2016, the company added shoes for children to its inventory. In August 2016, the company entered into a franchising agreement with Apparel Brands to open DSW stores in the Middle East. In March 2017, the company reached a deal with Under Armour to carry Under Armour shoes in DSW stores. In June 2017, the company opened a store in

Oman Oman ( ; ar, عُمَان ' ), officially the Sultanate of Oman ( ar, سلْطنةُ عُمان ), is an Arabian country located in southwestern Asia. It is situated on the southeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula, and spans the mouth of ...

, its first store in the Middle East. In May 2018, the company acquired the remaining shares of Town Shoes to obtain complete ownership of the company. In February 2019, the company announced an addition of nail salons to 5 stores, after testing the concept in 2 stores in Columbus, Ohio. In March 2019, DSW rebranded their corporate name to Designer Brands. The company also changed its ticker symbol on the

NYSE The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its liste ...

from "DSW" to "DBI" effective April 2, 2019. Entertainer

Jennifer Lopez Jennifer Lynn Affleck (' Lopez; born July 24, 1969), also known as J.Lo, is an American singer, actress and dancer. In 1991, she began appearing as a Fly Girl dancer on the sketch comedy television series '' In Living Color'', where she re ...

collaborated with the brand to launch the March 2020 line. When the chain closed all its retail stores due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

, and fashion trends shifted as a result of the increase in

remote work Remote work, also called work from home (WFH), work from anywhere, telework, remote job, mobile work, and distance work is an employment arrangement in which employees do not commute to a central place of work, such as an office building, ware ...

, the line was redesigned to include sneakers and comfort shoes.

References

External links

{{Authority control Shoe companies of the United States Online retailers of the United States American companies established in 1969 Clothing companies established in 1969 Retail companies established in 1969 Footwear retailers of the United States Companies based in the Columbus, Ohio metropolitan area Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange 1969 establishments in the United States