J.Jill is an American
retailer
Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholesaler, and ...
headquartered in
Quincy, Massachusetts
Quincy ( ) is a coastal U.S. city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the largest city in the county and a part of Metropolitan Boston as one of Boston's immediate southern suburbs. Its population in 2020 was 101,636, making ...
that specializes in
womenswear.
J.Jill was founded in the
Berkshires
The Berkshires () are a highland geologic region located in the western parts of Massachusetts and northwest Connecticut. The term "Berkshires" is normally used by locals in reference to the portion of the Vermont-based Green Mountains that ex ...
, in
Great Barrington, Massachusetts
Great Barrington is a town in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 7,172 at the 2020 census. Both a summer resort and home to Ski Butternut, ...
, as a specialty store, by Karl Lipsky (1914—2009),
in 1955, which he named for his wife, Jenifer, and daughter, Jill.
Lipsky had previously founded Jenifer House, a catalog fashion retailer.
In 2006, J.Jill was acquired by rival retailer
The Talbots, Inc., ceasing to be a publicly traded company; Talbots topped
Liz Claiborne
Anne Elisabeth Jane Claiborne (March 31, 1929 – June 26, 2007) was an American fashion designer and businesswoman. Her success was built upon stylish yet affordable apparel for career women featuring colorfully tailored separates that co ...
in a "bidding war" for ownership of J. Jill, paying US$517 million for the brand.
In 2009,
Golden Gate Capital
Golden Gate Capital is an American private equity firm based in San Francisco. The firm makes investments in a number of select industries, including technology, financial services, retail and industrial, through leveraged buyout transactions, as ...
acquired the company for a devalued $63 million.
On March 9, 2017, J.Jill again became a
publicly traded company on the
New York Stock Exchange
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 ...
(NYSE), trading under the ticker symbol JILL. In June 2019, its shares took the biggest percentage decline since its 2017
IPO, plummeting 53.5%, which analysts blamed on design and color issues surrounding its inventory, and a premature move from its catalog model to a digital sales platform.
In May 2020, during 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 ...
, J.Jill donated $50,000 to First Responders First, through its J.Jill Compassion Fund, and launched a campaign for National Nurses Month, offering a shopping voucher for its newest collection to nurses, first responders, and healthcare workers.
References
External links
J.Jill
2017 initial public offerings
Retail companies of the United States
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