The Faherty family continues to extend its reach with a new category launch, its first move outside the U.S., a continued retail rollout and an expanded relationship with an NBA star.
And it’s all being financed internally.
The company — which was started 11 years ago by twin brothers Alex and Mike Faherty, who grew up surfing on the New Jersey shore — is a sustainably sourced East Coast-skewed men’s sportswear collection with a muted color palette that offers an alternative to the brightly colored California surf brands. Faherty, which also counts Alex’s wife Kerry Docherty and their mother Ninie Norris as key players, has grown to more than $200 million in sales with a robust wholesale business and 67 stores.
Rumors surfaced last year that the company had hired a financial adviser to find potential investors or to sell a minority stake. Alex Faherty, who worked at Cerberus Capital Management and Greenhill & Co. before joining his brother to launch their brand, acknowledged: “We did have conversations, but there’s nothing worth mentioning.”
Pushed on whether Faherty was seeking outside partners, he said, “We aren’t actively doing anything. We have a great relationship with JP Morgan and we’re not going anywhere.”
Instead, the family is continuing down the path it has forged on its own. First up is the launch of sunglasses. Although the company had sold eyewear in the past online and in its stores, it was from other brands.
“It was not a concentrated effort,” Mike Faherty said. “It makes so much sense for us and I was excited to find new things to design.”
Mike Faherty worked for Ralph Lauren before starting his own brand. He said working on the hardware necessary to create sunglasses was new to him and quite different from designing apparel, “but I enjoyed the challenge.”
The result is a tight assortment of seven unisex frames, with production contracted to Safilo, that range in price from $98 for the All-Day, a sporty, foldable model, to $148 for the other six pieces. They include the Byron, a classic aviator; the Weber, an updated square shape named for Bruce Weber, and the Norris, a model sporting Mike Faherty’s middle name.
He said the assortment “embodies the brand” and each model is created from 100 percent postconsumer polycarbonate derived from recycled plastic frames and water bottles and features polarized lenses.
“That was the jumping-off point,” he said, adding that he “geeked out” with the subtle branding elements on each style, including its trademark Sun and Waves logo on all models, a surf stripe detail on the hinge joints of some styles and a case with a hiking-inspired pull cord.
The expansion into sunglasses follows the launch of denim last August, followed shortly after by bags.
Coming in the fall, Mike Faherty said, is a “cool collaboration with Saucony,” an update on the footwear brand’s Shadow model. “That will be the first true shoe we’ve ever done,” he said, adding that he believes Saucony is “ready for a lifestyle moment,” joining popular newcomers such as Hoka and On.
But first, Alex Faherty said, the company will be launching at wholesale internationally this spring/summer season, starting with El Corte Inglés in Spain and Liverpool in Mexico. “We’re slowly working our way into the international market,” he said, adding that Europe is also on their radar for the future.
“And we’re continuing to figure out our retail rollout,” Alex Faherty continued. The brand opened 15 stores last year to bring its total to 67 and there are “more on the table.” This year, stores will be added in Palm Springs, Calif.; Westfield, N.J.; Washington, D.C.; Newport, R.I.; San Diego; Westport, Conn.; Hingham, Mass.; Fort Worth, Tex., and Delray Beach, Fla.
At the same time, the company is focusing on expanding its “very successful” women’s business, he said. Women’s now represents 35 percent of overall sales.
Another popular product is Faherty’s partnership with Jalen Brunson of the New York Knicks. Mike Faherty said they connected because the brothers as well as the athlete spent a lot of time on the Jersey Shore as kids. “We met through mutual friends and just hit it off,” he said.
Brunson started wearing the Faherty brand and they talked about working together. “He said he’d love to partner with us and be an ambassador for the brand,” Mike Faherty said. “That’s a first for us.”
Those conversations led to a local licensing deal between the company and the New York Knicks and the creation of a limited-edition capsule at the end of March that was sold exclusively at Madison Square Garden where the team plays.
The collection, which was limited to 400 pieces, featured five Faherty bestselling items — the marled cotton cardigan, whitewater hoodie, sunwashed slub hoodie, sunwashed T-shirt and legend sweater shirt — updated with retro logos of the team. The collection had a 50 percent sell-through on launch day and is now sold out.
Faherty also tapped Brunson to appear in a national TV spot that launched during the NCAA Men’s Final Four tournament this month. The spot is intended to showcase the athlete’s off-the-court style and includes a voiceover of him talking about Faherty and why it works for him.
As lifelong Knicks fans, Mike Faherty described this partnership as “pretty epic” for the family. “Putting together a collection for the Knicks was a real mind-bender for us” and the company expects to offer additional collections in the future.
