Scandi womenswear label Saks Potts will close down in spring 2025 after a decade in operation.
The independent brand landscape has been particularly challenging in recent years, with rising costs and subdued consumer spending forcing many to file for administration or bankruptcy. But for Saks Potts, it wasn’t a financial decision. In fact, the brand says it has achieved consistent annual sales growth of 25 per cent since its founding in 2014 and that 2024 is set to be its strongest financial year yet.
Why let a good thing go? “Barbara [Potts] and I started Saks Potts when we were very young — we were 19 and 20 years old and we’ve done this throughout our whole 20s,” says Cathrine Saks. “It truly has been the best 10 years of our lives, but we are also now at the stage where we feel it’s time to look at the next 10 years. We’re both creative people and want to continuously reinvent ourselves.”
The founders and designers have been friends since kindergarten and set up their brand with less than €1,000. It rose to prominence in part due to the popularity of its ’90s-style shearling-trimmed Foxy coat (which was initially made from mink and fox, but transitioned away from fur in 2022), and has been worn by the likes of Bella Hadid and Kendall Jenner.
The brand has reinvented itself a few times over the past decade, moving away from bright Y2K colours to a more neutral aesthetic and expanding its product offering into new categories. Today, it has 15 employees and almost 50 stockists (the founders did not disclose its turnover).
The pair got close to selling Saks Potts to an interested party late last year and again this summer but decided against it. “We’ve talked about whether we should sell or have an investor, but it would be hard having someone else control the narrative and design direction,” says Saks. “If the business had a different name, it might have been a different story, but it is really because it’s our last names,” adds Potts.
While Saks Potts has maintained steady finances, the founders emphasise how challenging the landscape is right now. “The fashion industry is having a hard time, especially wholesale,” says Potts, highlighting the loss of Matches, which had been one of its biggest stockists. Saks says direct-to-consumer (DTC) has never been stronger for Saks Potts, with sales in its Copenhagen store up 80 per cent and e-commerce sales up 50 per cent in the last year. “[To be successful today] brands should have an authentic and precise offering in terms of your brand narrative and products because there are so many brands,” Potts continues.
Saks Potts will not present any further collections, so the current collections (pre-spring and spring 2025) are its last. “After 10 years of a lot of hard work, we want to take some time to empower ourselves and think about what to do next,” says Saks. “For sure, we will begin a new, exciting adventure. We don’t know if it will be something we do together or separately, but we’re excited to share more when we can.”
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