Online men’s activewear purveyor opens S.F. store.
Gap’s online brand shifts to S.F. store and truck
Hill City, a seller of men’s activewear owned by Gap Inc., opened its first store in San Francisco’s Hayes Valley neighborhood Tuesday. It’s an experiment that highlights the challenges of traditional clothing sellers as Amazon expands its offerings and directtoconsumer startups dominate social media.
The 500squarefoot store will stay for at least a year as the San Francisco company tests a strategy of going from web sales to brick and mortar. Hill City began selling online a year ago, as part of Gap Inc.’s response to the growing athleisure trend, where consumers favor clothes that blur the line between workout wear and work apparel.
The new store, nestled between a jewelry store and barber shop on Octavia Street, will stock top sellers selected from its 80 products, ranging from shirt jackets, hoodies, work pants and running shorts. Hill City touts its clothes as the “juxtaposition of the outdoors with city life.”
Hill City also has a mobile strategy, though this one doesn’t have to do with smartphones. Last week, Gap introduced a roving Hill City truck. The first stop for the store on wheels was the Anchor Public Taps in Potrero Hill, where it sold thermal jackets and Tshirts. In the future, it will make stops at events like street fairs and marathons, selling clothes but also functioning as a movable ad for the brand.
“We’re creating a physical interaction with the
brand with the popup store and the truck,” said Noah Palmer, head of Hill City. “Customers today expect multiple touch points. It’s not exclusive to just a website or to an app or to a store. We need to be where they are.”
It’s not technically Hill City’s first foray into stores; it offered its clothing last year at several Athleta stores — another Gap brand — including one on Fillmore Street. But its arrival coincides with strong growth in sales of active menswear. That market is currently sized at $88 billion, according to Coresight Research, a research firm. Athletic companies like Nike and Adidas dominate it, rather than traditional menswear sellers like Gap and Levi’s.
For Gap Inc., Hill City’s success is even more crucial as it continues a planned split into two publicly traded companies. In February, the company announced it would spin off Old Navy and group its other entities — the Gap brand, Athleta, Banana Republic, Intermix and Hill City — in a yettobenamed business. The latter portfolio now also includes Janie and Jack, the children’s clothing business it bought from bankrupt Gymboree this year.
“When you have a $16 billion revenue portfolio and Old Navy represents half of that, Hill City, as well as the other sister brands, will have a bigger impact” on the new company’s performance, Palmer said.
Hill City, the youngest Gap brand, hopes to mirror the success of Athleta, which sells women’s activewear.
“Athleta is the more successful among the brands and it’s been successful in part, because younger people enjoy more casual work environments,” said Cathy Hotka, who runs a retail consultancy in Washington. It makes sense for Gap Inc. to pursue men, too, she said.
Hill City will continue to piggyback on Athleta’s poularity, with seven Athleta stores continuing to stock the menswear line.
Palmer said that there are “lots of guys that care about both performance and aesthetics and the company is a lot less focused on demo
“We’re creating a physical with the interaction brand with the popup store and the truck.” Noah Palmer, head of Hill City
graphics. We’re a lot more concerned with how he spends his time and what he values.”
Hill City’s pricing — pieces average $80 to $100 — and its first store location in San Francisco suggest a focus on urban consumers, Hotka said.
Palmer said San Francisco was a great testing ground, both because of its weather and a workforce that prefers casual attire, primarily in the tech sector.
“A lot of what we make are for what we call ‘microclimates.’ We’re talking about a day where it could be raining in the morning with temperatures swinging much higher later,” Palmer said. “Here, it can sometimes feel like you’re living in five different cities.”