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fibres, launched, 1992; ready to wear in Japan, 1993; 240 retail stores worldwide, by 1994. Sub lines include Esprit Footwear and Accessories, Esprit Kids, Suzic Tompkins, and Dr. Seuss; also sleep, bath, and lingerie collections. Address: 900 Minnesota Street, San Francisco, California 94107, USA. When we started the Plain Jane Dress Company in 1968, we never dreamed it would develop into a worldwide organization now known as Esprit, with operations in 40 countries. "Esprit de Corp.," our official corporate name, was intended to inspire the spirit of the organization and evoke a sense of cooperation, camaraderie and community. When we started Esprit we had no previous experience whatsoever in the fashion business, in fact what business skills we might have possessed came from being in the mountain climbing equipment industry for a brief time, where any reference to fashion was an anathema. The idea of fashion, image, and image making was far from our minds. It was not, in fact, until 12 years after the founding of the company that any attempt to form an image and create a context for the product was made. In 1980 a radical shift in direction was undertaken. A mixed bag of seven different trade names was consolidated under one name, Esprit, and a new logo along with new labels, tags, packaging, collection and strong fashion photography was created. As in all things that start modestly and by amateurs, progress, growth, expansion, and refinements come in steps and stages. Experience is gathered on the job and a process begins and evolves. Likewise, success leads to more opportunities and mistakes and to improvements and avoidance of repeating past errors, or hopefully so! It has long been understood that the psycho graphic profile of target customers, or the idea of getting "into" the head of the customer, will lead you to the best understanding of what makes the customer respond to product, advertising, and services. Therefore, a thorough understanding of this profile makes design that much easier. In the fashion industry, where trends of status related products are in a state of constant flux and evolution, the designer must be fast to respond to a changing marketplace. In the late 1960s teams of engineers working independently in Japan, Switzerland and the United States used newly created electronic watch components to completely reinvent the wrist watch. In the early 1970s it seemed unlikely that electronic womens mens watches would sell in large quantities. But today, when about 90 per cent of all watches made are electronic watches. Electronic wrist watches come in an enormous range of styles, some with analog dials and others with digital displays, mens sport watches, mens digital watches and serve every whim and purpose. How the watch industry reacted to electronics and how consumers reacted to electronic watches? The modern mechanical wrist watch was less a new invention than an adaptation. All watches work essentially the same way. In an electronic watch, a battery provides the power to sustain the oscillations of a quartz crystal, which vibrates thousands of times a second. In the quartz watch, the integrated circuit sustains the oscillations of the quartz crystal, divides the frequency down to one pulse per second and drives the display. Local differences in culture, economy, business structure and access to technical knowledge greatly influenced how the quartz watch developed in these three different settings. The Swiss watch industry had momentum and market share. Fine examples of wrist watches are chronograph wrist watches, automatic mens wrist watches, mens automatic watches, and womens wrist watches. Today, Esprit designs, manufacturers, and distributes product lines four seasons per year, including infant, toddler, kids, menswear, jeans, womens wear skirt Esprit pump and footwear, accessories, bath and bed, eyewear, and ladies esprit watches. Some of very popular collection Esprit chronograph watch Esprit blazer, bag and handbag, and Esprit shirts. This adds up to over 60 million garments and accessories annually. As a privately held network of companies, we employ more than 4,000 people. Because clothing is one of our most basic means of self expression, the fashion industry lends itself toward the communication of values, and offers us the challenge and opportunity to interpret the ongoing changes throughout the world. Our corporate mission statement is: "Be informed. Be involved. Make a difference." It may seem like an idealistic and unusual guiding philosophy for an international fashion company, but Esprit has never been "business as usual." The Esprit label graces clothing Esprit shoes, fashion wrist watches for men and for women, accessories anything a woman can wear with comfort both at work and at play. As Woman magazine put it, Esprit is "part of that huge, growing category of well priced clothes that range from the street smart style of DKNY [Donna Karan New York] and CK Calvin Klein to the career oriented mood of Ellen Tracy and Anne Klein IL" Perhaps the most distinguishing features of Esprit fashions are what the clothing isn't. Esprit labels may never appear on the clingy cocktail dress, the stifling "power suit," or the crippling high heeled pump. Instead, a typical Esprit outfit shows a looser fitting rayon vest, esprit blouse or tunic over wide legged pants or perhaps a flowing, calf length Esprit skirt made of soft cotton. Womens clothing available in different sizes as 36 Esprit 38, 39, 40 Esprit 42. According to the journal View on Colour, Esprit "has come to epitomize the Northern California lifestyle, an informative mix of a sunny climate, bold colors, outdoor sports, eternal youth, and social values. Esprit's saucy sportswear ... encouraged (if not triggered) the worldwide sportswear boom." This success was the result of the personal vision of Esprit de Corp.'s co founder, Susie Tompkins, who got her start, along with partner Jane Tise, in her native San Francisco in 1968, selling home made frocks under the name Plain Jane. Whether it be a chronograph digital watch, a jeans Esprit, a womens petite clothing or tall womens or plus clothing for big women and plus size, a blouse Esprit a Esprit buy comes with the confidence that it will be in style and proper for a stage of life.
Extract from “Contemporary Fashion”, Editor: Richard Martin. Detroit: St. James Press, 1995.
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