N.Y. firm stepping up to design, develop and market Stride Rite
The owner of the 98-year-old, Boston-born Stride Rite has a deal to sell the licensing rights for the children’s shoe brand to Vida Shoes International.
Rockford, Mich.-based Wolverine Worldwide Inc. declined to reveal terms of the multiyear agreement under which New York’s Vida will be the global licensee for Stride Rite footwear and other products, and will design, develop and market the brand beginning next month.
Stride Rite is currently based in Waltham. Wolverine declined to comment on how many employees the brand has there and what will happen to them. When Wolverine relocated Stride Rite’s regional headquarters to Waltham from Lexington in 2016, it was home to 400 employees as well as the Saucony, Sperry and Keds brands.
The Vida deal will allow Wolverine to focus on its other performance and lifestyle shoe brands, it said. Wolverine has created a new children’s group to focus on the category for its Keds, Saucony, Sperry, Merrell and Hush Puppies lines.
The moves are part of a transformation effort that has included closing all company Stride Rite stores, streamlining operations, supply-chain tightening and consolidating vendors.
The stores were losing money, according to C.L. King analyst Steve Marotta. Although Stride Rite’s wholesale business is profitable, the brand — whose shoes go down to infant sizes — isn’t in Wolverine’s “wheelhouse,” he said.
“It’s been a little bit of a problem child,” Marotta said. “The footwear that they sell tends to go through different distribution channels.”