PREMIUM DENIM
True Religion’s New Owners Lay Off Scores of Employees
Seven months after being bought by a private-equity firm, True Religion has laid off at least 70 people—many of them department heads and production people.
All this comes weeks after Lynne Koplin, who had been the interim chief executive and then was named chief merchandising officer, resigned to look for another job.
The mass layoff of 70 people was announced on Dec. 12. A town-hall meeting was held the following day, Dec. 13, at the company’s headquarters in Vernon, Calif., to explain the dismissals. The company said it would have no comment about the layoffs.
Angela Furlong, the women’s design director who was hired by True Religion founder Jeff Lubell 14 months ago, was told she no longer has a job. So was Neetu Sehgal, who was senior director of global sourcing, and Erin Reine, who had been the fabric and trim buyer at True Religion for six years.
In October, True Religion’s in-house counsel, attorney Deborah Greaves, who had been instrumental in pursuing counterfeiters knocking off True Religion blue jeans, was told she would be replaced by attorney Ilene Eskenazi, who previously worked at Red Bull. Greaves left the company days ago.
TowerBrook Capital Partners, which in May announced it was buying True Religion for $835 million, immediately made several high-level executive changes following its purchase. The founder, Jeff Lubell, is no longer at the company.
The new chief executive is David Conn, who previously worked at VF Corp., where he was president of VF retail licensed brands. Prior to VF Corp., he was executive vice president of Iconix Brand Group, a New York concern that has a stable of well-known brands that include Badgley Mischka, Ed Hardy, OP, Mossimo, Rampage, Material Girl and Buffalo David Bitten.
Gary Harvey was brought on board in September as the new creative director. For eight years he ran his own creative consultancy in London.
Many of the employees were shocked to hear they no longer had jobs. “There were all kinds of people laid off,” said Furlong, the former women’s design director, “from heads of departments to sewers."
