California Apparel News

Costa Mesa, Calif.–based Paul Frank Industries is seeing a future as cheerful as its iconic Julius the monkey.

Last week the company, which had been battling founder and designer Paul Frank Sunich in court since he was fired in 2005, announced it had amicably settled the dispute over Sunich’s interest in the company. Details of the settlement remain private. “We’re very happy that chapter of the business is behind us, and we look forward to building this brand into what we know it can be,” said Ryan Hauser, who, along with John Oswald, now shares ownership of Paul Frank Industries.

Part of that brand-building involves some cutting of the fat, and that includes Julius & Friends, Paul Frank Industries’ attempt to woo a juniors customer. The year-old brand—which featured Paul Frank’s younger, more novelty- and character-driven pieces––targeted juniors retailers and online novelty shops. Paul Frank’s more-sophisticated fashion-driven Paul Frank line stood apart, selling in mid-tier and specialty boutiques with higher price points and an older demographic.

The Julius & Friends line, though snatched up by retailers such as com and Tilly’s, never caught on with shoppers. “It could have been for any number of reasons,” Hauser said. “It could have been that customers saw the graphics and, because it wasn’t branded “Paul Frank,” thought it was a brand that was trying to rip off Paul Frank designs,” he said. “The weakness wasn’t the design. We feel it was more of a branding issue, and we saw a need for a new branding,” Hauser said.

In evaluating the line, Hauser and his team came to the conclusion that Paul Frank’s two most powerful assets were the company’s name recognition and Julius. “We weren’t making the most of the name with Julius & Friends, so we decided to shelve it. Maybe if we’d given it more time and threw enough marketing dollars at it, we could have made it stick,” Hauser said.

The Julius-print pajamas, T-shirts and trademark vinyl accessories, which lived for a year under the Julius & Friends label, will return to the Paul Frank label for Spring 2008. Retailers won’t be affected by the branding move, as price points for the offerings will remain the same. If anything, Hauser said, the company expects retailers to embrace the newly branded juniors collection. “It makes the most of the Paul Frank name,” he said, and that’s what sells.

Alan Martin, co-owner of The Denim Shop in Hope, Ark., said Julius & Friends sold well in his store. “It was a fun, whimsical deal, and it was good for impulse buys,” among the junior-high and high-school set who shop the store, he said. “I don’t carry the regular Paul Frank line, but I don’t think [the rebranding] will be a problem if they keep the same price point and looks.”

Amy Andrews, director of merchandising at the online store FreshPair.com, has carried Julius & Friends and Paul Frank since January and said the juniors line hasn’t sold as well as Paul Frank. “That’s mostly because our women customers tend to be a little older than the Julius target demographic.” Andrews, who featured a pair of Paul Frank underwear during FreshPair’s “National Underwear Day” fashion show in New York’s Times Square on Aug. 7, said the re-branding could only have a positive effect on her business. “I think it can only help sales, across the board. Paul Frank has better name recognition, and having it all under one hood will make marketing the brand that much easier.”

Hauser is careful to note that Paul Frank invested a lot in the Julius & Friends trademark and its associated trademarks and isn’t completely giving them up. “Julius & Friends could be a big media opportunity for us in the future. There are all types of possibilities,” he said. Potential options could be feature films, television specials and Internet Webisodes. Currently, Paul Frank has 27 Webisodes online that help introduce new characters and illustrate the brand’s quirky sensibility.

New kids

Spring 2008 will see the debut of two new Paul Frank divisions: tweens and infants. Driven by the success of Paul Frank’s kids’ line, Small Paul, the girls’, boys’ and babies’ lines are a natural progression, Hauser said. “Kids know and love the brand.”

The infants line, which will live under the Small Paul umbrella, will include character-driven cotton onesies, T-shirts, hoodies, sweats and accessories. The new Paul Frank Boys collection, which targets 8- to 14-year-olds, will feature miniaturized versions of the men’s Paul Frank offerings. That means plenty of Western-style woven shirts, striped polo shirts, cargo shorts and military-inspired jackets.

“Girls are a totally different story. They needed something all their own,” Hauser said. For the Paul Frank Girls line, all-new designs were developed, including cotton mini-dresses; jackets lined in contrast prints; and character-driven Tshirts, jumpers and swimwear. The Paul Frank Boys and Girls lines will be targeted at boutiques and major department stores. Buyers will get their first glimpse of the lines and the re-branded Paul Frank collection at the Project Global Trade Show, to be held Aug. 27–29 in Las Vegas.

On the horizon

Paul Frank has lots of projects in the works that will continue to expand the brand beyond apparel and accessories. A children’s book, “Only in Dreams,” set to be published by Chronicle Books, should be in bookstores soon. Medical scrubs, bedding, mobile-phone content and children’s furniture, set to debut for Holiday 2007, are the latest additions to the brand. “There is endless potential,” Hauser said.

There is one dark cloud. In May, Paul Frank filed a motion for a preliminary injunction against Sunich and Chaser Industries, a Compton, Calif.–based maker of licensed T-shirts, with whom Sunich created a Treestitch by Paul Frank Sunich line of T-shirts. The complaint, filed in the Central District Court of California, accuses Sunich of trademark infringement and false advertising in connection with his use of his full name, Paul Frank Sunich, as a designer and on projects including the Treestitch collection and his Web site (www.paulfranksunich.com).

Paul Frank Industries, which owns the trademark to the name Paul Frank, claims in the lawsuit that it is suffering and will continue to suffer “immediate and irreparable harm” if Sunich continues to use and work under his full name. The suit also says the work Sunich has done for the Treestitch line is “strikingly similar in genre and in appearance and design to Paul Frank’s own products.”

Last year, Sunich was enjoined by the court from using the name “Paul Frank Design.” “PFI owns the trademark to the name Paul Frank. This is not even a legal question nor the issue. Paul Sunich is attempting to cause confusion in the marketplace by using our marks; therefore we are in a dispute. This action would occur whether it was anyone in the world trying to use our marks. In this case it happens to be our former partner,” Hauser said.

Sunich could not be reached for comment.