Scotch & Soda to Open 22 Retail Locations by Yearend
Scotch & Soda is ramping up its retail presence.
The Amsterdam-based men’s and women’s brand will open 15 brick-and-mortar stores and seven in-store shops before the end of the year in Europe, Asia Pacific, North America and the Middle East. This will include new directly operated and franchise stores in Paris; Madrid; Philadelphia; Charlotte, N.C.; Gothenburg, Sweden; Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Mumbai, India; Bucharest, Romania; Dortmund and Stuttgart, Germany, and Perth, Australia.
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In addition, after a soft launch in August, the brand will officially open its first digital store on Tmall in China, a region it entered in July. To support the company’s move into the country, Scotch & Soda created social media accounts on Weibo, Little Red Book, WeChat and Douyin, and there are plans to open retail stores soon in key Chinese cities, the company said.
Scotch & Soda chief executive officer Frederick Lukoff said that despite the “challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in the retail Industry,” the company is “pursuing the expansion of our retail network at a global level, strengthening our footprint in markets where we are already present, as well as entering key markets such as China, that we see as full of potential to reach new customers and introduce them to our brand.”
In Europe, the new stores include a new 1,400-square-foot store in the Saint Germain neighborhood, the brand’s first location on the Left Bank, and a second store in Madrid’s Salamanca historic district that will open by the end of October. In Germany, the brand will open its first franchise store in Sindelfingen, near the city of Stuttgart, as well as a company-owned store in Dortmund in December, which will bring its total retail count in that country to 34 by the end of the year.
In the United States, Scotch & Soda will open two new directly operated stores this month in the King of Prussia shopping mall near Philadelphia and the SouthPark Mall in Charlotte.
Since January Scotch & Soda has opened 34 brick-and-mortar stores and 27 shops-in-shop, and with the new stores and shops, it will bring the brand’s total retail and franchise portfolio to 249 stores and 280 shops-in-shop globally by the end of the year.
All facades will sport the new brand logo revealed in March, and the Free Spirit design that includes warm colors and sleek design elements as well as sustainable elements such as LED lighting, FSC-certified wood herringbone flooring and hangers made of recycled materials.
Courtesy of Scotch & Soda
Turning to its category offerings, Scotch & Soda will expand its assortment for holiday and spring by adding three new styles of bags, a reporter and crossbody model in faux leather and a foldable tote made from recycled nylon, that will be available exclusively in its owned and franchise stores and online for the first season. It is also expanding its Barfly fragrance line into new categories including home and travel sizes, along with gift sets.
To support this expansion, the brand will open a 296,000-square-foot warehouse in Hoofddorp, outside Amsterdam, in the spring. It will include a roof entirely fitted with solar panels and automatically irrigated vertical gardens.
Scotch & Soda was created in Amsterdam in 1985 and offers men’s, women’s and children’s apparel and accessories, as well as eyewear and fragrances. It is carried in more than 7,000 doors in 70 countries.
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