Lands' End is an American clothing and home decor retailer founded in 1963 and based in Dodgeville,

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michi ...

, that specializes in casual clothing,

luggage Baggage or luggage consists of bags, cases, and containers which hold a traveler's personal articles while the traveler is in transit. A modern traveler can be expected to have packages containing clothing, toiletries, small possessions, trip ...

, and

home furnishings Furniture refers to movable objects intended to support various human activities such as seating (e.g., stools, chairs, and sofas), eating (tables), storing items, eating and/or working with an item, and sleeping (e.g., beds and hammocks). F ...

. The majority of the company's business is conducted through

mail order Mail order is the buying of goods or services by mail delivery. The buyer places an order for the desired products with the merchant through some remote methods such as: * Sending an order form in the mail * Placing a telephone call * Placing ...

and

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

sales, but the company also has retail stores, primarily in the

Upper Midwest The Upper Midwest is a region in the northern portion of the U.S. Census Bureau's Midwestern United States. It is largely a sub-region of the Midwest. Although the exact boundaries are not uniformly agreed-upon, the region is defined as referrin ...

, along with international shops in the UK, Germany,

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

, France and

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous c ...

. From 2002 to 2014, Lands' End was a subsidiary of

Sears Holdings Sears Holdings Corporation was an American holding company headquartered in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. It was the parent company of the chain stores Kmart and Sears and was founded after the former purchased the latter in 2005. It was the 20th ...

History

Lands' End began as a

mail-order Mail order is the buying of goods or services by mail delivery. The buyer places an order for the desired products with the merchant through some remote methods such as: * Sending an order form in the mail * Placing a telephone call * Placing ...

yachting supply company in 1963 in Chicago. It was founded by Gary Comer,Dennis Hevesi
"Gary C. Comer, 78, Founder of Lands’ End, Dies,"
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', October 6, 2006. along with his partners,

1963 Pan American Games The 1963 Pan American Games were held from April 20 to May 5, 1963, in São Paulo, Brazil. Host city selection For the first time, two cities submitted bids to host the 1963 Pan American Games that were recognized by the Pan American Sports O ...

gold medalist sailors Richard Stearns and

Robert Halperin Robert Sherman "Bob" Halperin (January 26, 1908 – May 8, 1985), nicknamed "Buck", was an American Star class sailor, and Olympic bronze medalist and Pan American Games gold medalist. He was also a college and National Football League (NFL) ...

, and two of Stearns' employees. As the business became successful, it expanded into general clothing and home furnishings, and moved to

Dodgeville, Wisconsin Dodgeville is a city in and the county seat of Iowa County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 4,984 at the 2020 census, making it the county's most populous city. Dodgeville is part of the Madison Metropolitan Statistical Area. His ...

in 1978. The company is named from its sailboat heritage, after

Land's End Land's End ( kw, Penn an Wlas or ''Pedn an Wlas'') is a headland and tourist and holiday complex in western Cornwall, England, on the Penwith peninsula about west-south-west of Penzance at the western end of the A30 road. To the east of it i ...

, but the misplaced apostrophe in the company name was a

typographical error A typographical error (often shortened to typo), also called a misprint, is a mistake (such as a spelling mistake) made in the typing of printed (or electronic) material. Historically, this referred to mistakes in manual type-setting (typography). ...

that Comer could not afford to change, as promotional materials had already been printed.Suzanne Kapner
"Sears Weighs A Spinoff of Lands' End; Core Chains' Losses Grow,"
'The Wall Street Journal'', October 30, 2013. Lands' End's catalog business expanded in the 1980s, as mail-order retail grew nationwide. The company expanded its computer systems and customer service operations. In 1986, it became a

publicly traded 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 (lis ...

. The 1990s saw continued growth, as the company began international expansion and became an early embracer of

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 managemen ...

, establishing a website and "live chat" customer service. Lands' End was named among the 100 Best Companies To Work For In America by ''FORTUNE'' Magazine. In the late 1980s, Lands' End was the jersey supplier of the

United States national rugby union team The United States men's national rugby union team represents the United States in men's international rugby union. Nicknamed the Eagles, it is controlled by USA Rugby, the national governing body for the sport of rugby union in the United Stat ...

. In 2002, Sears acquired the company for $2 billion in cash. In addition to operating mail order and online business and Lands' End Inlet stores (a reverse pun used for its

outlet store An outlet store, factory outlet or factory shop is a brick and mortar or online store in which manufacturers sell their stock directly to the public. Traditionally, a factory outlet was a store attached to a factory or warehouse, sometimes allowin ...

s), Sears offered a Lands' End clothing line in a large number of its retail stores. In 2012, the company formed an "online partnership" with the UK's

Debenhams Debenhams plc was a British department store chain operating in the United Kingdom, Denmark and the Republic of Ireland. It was founded in 1778 as a single store in London and grew to 178 locations across those countries, also owning the Danish ...

and

House of Fraser House of Fraser (also operating as Frasers) is a British department store group with 44 locations across the United Kingdom, which is now part of Frasers Group. It was established in Glasgow, Scotland in 1849 as Arthur and Fraser. By 1891, it w ...

department stores; in 2016 it began selling on

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology co ...

. In November 2009, Lands' End launched a new line called Lands' End Canvas, which offers a more fashion-oriented selection of casual clothing for men and women. On December 6, 2013, Sears Holding Corp. announced that it would spin off Lands' End catalog business as a separate company by distributing stock to the retailer's stockholders. Lands' End stock began trading on the

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market () (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations Stock Market) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the US by volume, and ranked second ...

on April 7, 2014. Jerome Griffith became CEO in March 2017, succeeding Federica Marchionni.Phil Wahba
"How Lands' End Emerged From the Shadow of Sears and Prospered Again"
''Fortune'', December 7, 2018. In 2016, feminist activist

Gloria Steinem Gloria Marie Steinem (; born March 25, 1934) is an American journalist and social-political activist who emerged as a nationally recognized leader of second-wave feminism in the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Steinem was a c ...

was featured in the catalog of Lands' End. After an outcry from

anti-abortion Anti-abortion movements, also self-styled as pro-life or abolitionist movements, are involved in the abortion debate advocating against the practice of abortion and its legality. Many anti-abortion movements began as countermovements in respons ...

customers, the company removed Steinem from their website, stating on their Facebook page: The company then faced further criticism online, this time both from customers who were still unhappy that Steinem had been featured in the first place, and customers who were unhappy that Steinem had been removed. In 2019, Lands' End announced the closure of its remaining store-within-a-store branches in Sears stores, after Sears Holdings filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The last of these closed by the end of 2019. As of the end of 2021, the company operates 30 retail stores.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Retail companies established in 1963 Clothing brands of the United States Companies based in Wisconsin Mail-order retailers Online retailers of the United States Sears Holdings Sears Holdings brands Iowa County, Wisconsin 1963 establishments in Illinois 2014 initial public offerings Companies listed on the Nasdaq