DavidJamesTO
Active Member
Strange. The Bay branches in both Kitchener and Cambridge got rid of theirs.
|
|
|
Skeezix
Senior Member
Member Bio
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2007
- Messages
- 4,343
- Reaction score
- 2,688
- Location
- East of this, west of that
The pragmatic fashionista: Bonnie Brooks
With a focus on newer labels and price, Bonnie Brooks has big plans for the Bay
MARINA STRAUSS
From Thursday's Globe and Mail
April 23, 2009 at 4:00 AM EDT
TORONTO — RETAILING REPORTER
Bonnie Brooks is on a mission: To capture the recession's new breed of shopper.
At the Bay, where Ms. Brooks took over as chief executive officer last year with a mandate to boost sales and breathe new life into the tired but storied department store, this shopper is called the "pragmatist."
The pragmatist spends an average of $1,900 a year on clothing, and she covets timeless, classic pieces, mostly from mid-priced brands such as Lauren by Ralph Lauren.
Getting her to buy more at the store is key to Ms. Brooks's turnaround effort. She thinks she can persuade these shoppers - who often pick up just one item, such as lipstick or hosiery at the Bay - to spend 20 per cent more at the store by expanding the stock of updated classics.
"Customers come to us, are willing to try us," said Ms. Brooks, clad in a contemporary silk-and-linen jacket by Canadian designer Lida Baday over a black dress. "But we're not at this moment satisfying every customer who comes through the door."
Last week, her plan to satisfy more customers got a big boost. After seven months in the top job, she got a green light from the board of directors of parent Hudson's Bay Co. for her bold new road map for its flagship chain.
Her recipe entails focusing more than ever on fashion and scaling back underperforming offerings of appliances, furniture and home decor; doubling the Bay's stock of higher-end lines while, more importantly, expanding the mid-priced labels; and ditching half the store's 1,200 brands - worth more than $1-billion in annual retail sales - in favour of more contemporary labels.
And she's not just chasing the pragmatist. Ms. Brooks is also pursuing the "fashion" shopper, who spends about 30 per cent more on clothing but favours trendier styles that don't break her bank.
"The Bay had at one time a much higher fashion positioning," the company's first female CEO said as she settled into its boardroom, surrounded by oil paintings of the men who governed the company in years past. "We want to rightfully earn that back."
In an interview, Ms. Brooks revealed that she is betting she can bolster the Bay's estimated $2.5-billion of annual sales by one-third - or $750-million - over five years. For 2009, in the most brutal recession in decades, her business plan calls for a slight uptick in sales, if anything, even as rivals expect much worse. It would be a shift from past years, when the Bay's sales were in steady decline.
Her challenge in the 92-store chain would be daunting in a strong economy, let alone in the current downturn. Department stores have been shedding market share for years to specialty chains and discounters. Ms. Brooks, a Canadian with prominent international retail experience, was hired last summer to lead the Bay's ambitious revival strategy.
It helps that she has the backing of Richard Baker, the U.S. real estate magnate who bought HBC last July. Some suppliers have expressed privately their concerns about his financial commitment given the credit crunch. But they may find some comfort in another decision his board made last week: It approved almost $100-million of capital spending for the Bay in 2009.
The money will go partly toward starting a makeover of the downtown Toronto flagship store by superstar interior design firm Yabu Pushelberg, whose projects have included luxury stores for Louis Vuitton in Hong Kong and Tiffany in New York. It's no coincidence that Ms. Brooks worked with the Toronto-based firm to restyle stores for fashion powerhouse Lane Crawford Joyce Group of Hong Kong, where she spearheaded its turnaround as president.
At the Bay, Ms. Brooks' catch-up job is immense. Store productivity, measured in sales per square foot, has been slipping for years, having dropped to $165 in 2005 from $170 the previous year, according to public documents before the company was privatized. She aims to raise it to $200 "as quickly as possible," which would take it to less than half the estimated productivity at some U.S. luxury department stores and Wal-Mart Canada. The average American department store weighs in with roughly $180 (U.S.).
"What she wants to do is bold in these economic times," said George Hartman, a partner and retail specialist at investment bank Capital Canada Inc. and a former Bay Street merchandising analyst. "Hopefully the suppliers will co-operate, for one; and two, you hope consumer spending stays strong enough."
To boost productivity, Ms. Brooks is looking to shift space to faster-selling categories of apparel, shoes, handbags and cosmetics, and reduce offerings of slower-moving appliances, furniture and home decor. Her goal is to trim total inventory by 10 per cent as she focuses on stronger-performing areas.
To make room for an array of new lines aimed at the "pragmatist" and "fashion" customers, Ms. Brooks will drop about 600 underperforming labels over the next several years, including Tommy Hilfiger handbags and Mac & Jac women's apparel.
Today, Ms. Brooks is tapping her list of global fashion contacts to lure new labels to the Bay. Already she has convinced Juicy Couture and Diesel, among others, to stock some of their apparel lines at the retailer later this year.
"She has a great relationship with the Juicy people," said Catherine Claman, owner of the Montreal-based distributor of the brand in Canada. "Bonnie has a great relationship with a lot of the American brands. People believe in her and like working with her."
Among both pragmatist and fashion shoppers are a growing number of Asians who are "above average" spenders, Ms. Brooks said. They hanker after recognized labels and need smaller sizes. "For me, having lived in other parts of the world, there is a difference in the things many Asians like to wear."
But many customers are watching their bottom line and reluctant to pay huge sums for their fashions, she found in her research, which was conducted for HBC last fall by consulting firm Bain & Co. And so Ms. Brooks has to look for more moderately priced, but still stylish, brands, including dresses between $100 and $300, along with those at higher prices.
She is being helped by an economic slump that has pushed pricier design houses, such as Elie Tahari, to develop more affordable labels for cost-conscious consumers. In that vein, the Bay is introducing T Tahari and BCBGeneration.
"People are definitely going to see a shift in the way the store looks, in the products that we carry, in the contemporary feeling of the store," Ms. Brooks said. "We will be moving toward more modern customers and more hip customers."
She said the stores need to be smarter about using space, particularly in the oversized, multilevel outlets where customers rarely venture beyond the main floors.
Among her most unusual initiatives? Later this year, the Bay will install a fitness centre on one of the upper floors of the downtown Toronto store, an idea floated by Mr. Baker. As a shopping centre developer, he has his own roster of retail contacts to reach out to for fresh concepts. He's also discussing, for instance, bringing an American restaurant to the Bay.
While there is plenty of skepticism among industry experts about the Bay, they agree that Ms. Brooks is one of few executives with the savvy to lead a turnaround. "She's got the ability and the knowledge and the contacts to do it," said Mr. Hartman, the investment banker.
Ms. Brooks did it in her former position at Lane Crawford, transforming it into a luxury retailer with brands such as Prada and Stella McCartney. At the time, she was one of the first merchants to introduce a full line of Juicy clothing, helping establish its name in Asia and forging a personal relationship with its founder. In the 1980s, as an executive at Holt Renfrew, she played a part in the retailer's reinvigoration, refashioning it for a new career woman.
Now she thinks she can satisfy the Bay's "pragmatist" and "fashion" customers, partly by having walked in their shoes. "Throughout my career, I have been the customer, in terms of being a modern woman who's interested in fashion but also a pragmatist."
With a focus on newer labels and price, Bonnie Brooks has big plans for the Bay
MARINA STRAUSS
From Thursday's Globe and Mail
April 23, 2009 at 4:00 AM EDT
TORONTO — RETAILING REPORTER
Bonnie Brooks is on a mission: To capture the recession's new breed of shopper.
At the Bay, where Ms. Brooks took over as chief executive officer last year with a mandate to boost sales and breathe new life into the tired but storied department store, this shopper is called the "pragmatist."
The pragmatist spends an average of $1,900 a year on clothing, and she covets timeless, classic pieces, mostly from mid-priced brands such as Lauren by Ralph Lauren.
Getting her to buy more at the store is key to Ms. Brooks's turnaround effort. She thinks she can persuade these shoppers - who often pick up just one item, such as lipstick or hosiery at the Bay - to spend 20 per cent more at the store by expanding the stock of updated classics.
"Customers come to us, are willing to try us," said Ms. Brooks, clad in a contemporary silk-and-linen jacket by Canadian designer Lida Baday over a black dress. "But we're not at this moment satisfying every customer who comes through the door."
Last week, her plan to satisfy more customers got a big boost. After seven months in the top job, she got a green light from the board of directors of parent Hudson's Bay Co. for her bold new road map for its flagship chain.
Her recipe entails focusing more than ever on fashion and scaling back underperforming offerings of appliances, furniture and home decor; doubling the Bay's stock of higher-end lines while, more importantly, expanding the mid-priced labels; and ditching half the store's 1,200 brands - worth more than $1-billion in annual retail sales - in favour of more contemporary labels.
And she's not just chasing the pragmatist. Ms. Brooks is also pursuing the "fashion" shopper, who spends about 30 per cent more on clothing but favours trendier styles that don't break her bank.
"The Bay had at one time a much higher fashion positioning," the company's first female CEO said as she settled into its boardroom, surrounded by oil paintings of the men who governed the company in years past. "We want to rightfully earn that back."
In an interview, Ms. Brooks revealed that she is betting she can bolster the Bay's estimated $2.5-billion of annual sales by one-third - or $750-million - over five years. For 2009, in the most brutal recession in decades, her business plan calls for a slight uptick in sales, if anything, even as rivals expect much worse. It would be a shift from past years, when the Bay's sales were in steady decline.
Her challenge in the 92-store chain would be daunting in a strong economy, let alone in the current downturn. Department stores have been shedding market share for years to specialty chains and discounters. Ms. Brooks, a Canadian with prominent international retail experience, was hired last summer to lead the Bay's ambitious revival strategy.
It helps that she has the backing of Richard Baker, the U.S. real estate magnate who bought HBC last July. Some suppliers have expressed privately their concerns about his financial commitment given the credit crunch. But they may find some comfort in another decision his board made last week: It approved almost $100-million of capital spending for the Bay in 2009.
The money will go partly toward starting a makeover of the downtown Toronto flagship store by superstar interior design firm Yabu Pushelberg, whose projects have included luxury stores for Louis Vuitton in Hong Kong and Tiffany in New York. It's no coincidence that Ms. Brooks worked with the Toronto-based firm to restyle stores for fashion powerhouse Lane Crawford Joyce Group of Hong Kong, where she spearheaded its turnaround as president.
At the Bay, Ms. Brooks' catch-up job is immense. Store productivity, measured in sales per square foot, has been slipping for years, having dropped to $165 in 2005 from $170 the previous year, according to public documents before the company was privatized. She aims to raise it to $200 "as quickly as possible," which would take it to less than half the estimated productivity at some U.S. luxury department stores and Wal-Mart Canada. The average American department store weighs in with roughly $180 (U.S.).
"What she wants to do is bold in these economic times," said George Hartman, a partner and retail specialist at investment bank Capital Canada Inc. and a former Bay Street merchandising analyst. "Hopefully the suppliers will co-operate, for one; and two, you hope consumer spending stays strong enough."
To boost productivity, Ms. Brooks is looking to shift space to faster-selling categories of apparel, shoes, handbags and cosmetics, and reduce offerings of slower-moving appliances, furniture and home decor. Her goal is to trim total inventory by 10 per cent as she focuses on stronger-performing areas.
To make room for an array of new lines aimed at the "pragmatist" and "fashion" customers, Ms. Brooks will drop about 600 underperforming labels over the next several years, including Tommy Hilfiger handbags and Mac & Jac women's apparel.
Today, Ms. Brooks is tapping her list of global fashion contacts to lure new labels to the Bay. Already she has convinced Juicy Couture and Diesel, among others, to stock some of their apparel lines at the retailer later this year.
"She has a great relationship with the Juicy people," said Catherine Claman, owner of the Montreal-based distributor of the brand in Canada. "Bonnie has a great relationship with a lot of the American brands. People believe in her and like working with her."
Among both pragmatist and fashion shoppers are a growing number of Asians who are "above average" spenders, Ms. Brooks said. They hanker after recognized labels and need smaller sizes. "For me, having lived in other parts of the world, there is a difference in the things many Asians like to wear."
But many customers are watching their bottom line and reluctant to pay huge sums for their fashions, she found in her research, which was conducted for HBC last fall by consulting firm Bain & Co. And so Ms. Brooks has to look for more moderately priced, but still stylish, brands, including dresses between $100 and $300, along with those at higher prices.
She is being helped by an economic slump that has pushed pricier design houses, such as Elie Tahari, to develop more affordable labels for cost-conscious consumers. In that vein, the Bay is introducing T Tahari and BCBGeneration.
"People are definitely going to see a shift in the way the store looks, in the products that we carry, in the contemporary feeling of the store," Ms. Brooks said. "We will be moving toward more modern customers and more hip customers."
She said the stores need to be smarter about using space, particularly in the oversized, multilevel outlets where customers rarely venture beyond the main floors.
Among her most unusual initiatives? Later this year, the Bay will install a fitness centre on one of the upper floors of the downtown Toronto store, an idea floated by Mr. Baker. As a shopping centre developer, he has his own roster of retail contacts to reach out to for fresh concepts. He's also discussing, for instance, bringing an American restaurant to the Bay.
While there is plenty of skepticism among industry experts about the Bay, they agree that Ms. Brooks is one of few executives with the savvy to lead a turnaround. "She's got the ability and the knowledge and the contacts to do it," said Mr. Hartman, the investment banker.
Ms. Brooks did it in her former position at Lane Crawford, transforming it into a luxury retailer with brands such as Prada and Stella McCartney. At the time, she was one of the first merchants to introduce a full line of Juicy clothing, helping establish its name in Asia and forging a personal relationship with its founder. In the 1980s, as an executive at Holt Renfrew, she played a part in the retailer's reinvigoration, refashioning it for a new career woman.
Now she thinks she can satisfy the Bay's "pragmatist" and "fashion" customers, partly by having walked in their shoes. "Throughout my career, I have been the customer, in terms of being a modern woman who's interested in fashion but also a pragmatist."
prosperegal
Senior Member
^^^
Good for her. Now, let's clean up some of the suburban Bays. Outside of Yorkdale, all the other ones need better product.
Good for her. Now, let's clean up some of the suburban Bays. Outside of Yorkdale, all the other ones need better product.
vistaway
Active Member
So the article confirms that the downtown store will be redesigned by Yabu Pushelberg, and it will have an upper level converted to a fitness centre....interesting.
bAuHaUs
Active Member
Yes, very interesting turn of events for The Bay.....just wonder how much they will change though.
Jayomatic
Active Member
I wonder if the American restaurant could be something like Cheesecake Factory. Throw that upstairs and perhaps add a nice rooftop patio and you'll get your foot traffic. Something like the one above Macys in San Francisco. Looking forward to seeing what they have planned for the interior.
deerparker
Active Member
Yabu Pushelberg's projects at Bonnie Brooks's former domain, Lane Crawford, and Bergdorf Goodman in NYC are very impressive. Lots of photos on the website...
http://www.yabupushelberg.com
http://www.yabupushelberg.com
prosperegal
Senior Member
NOOOOO. They can't destroy the Arcadian Court (I had my formal/prom there) or Great Cooks.
I *DO* hope that HBC picks up Kate Spade. I've had a lot of trouble finding Kate Spade bags since they pulled out of Holts in 2008. I also want them to revamp the Bay store on Yonge and Bloor.
adma
Superstar
Though some of the Urban Shocker disposition may argue that Arcadian Court already became a Cheesecake Factory with its 20 yrs ago reno...
yyzhyd
Active Member
I emailed Cheesecake Factory after hearing a rumour they were planning a Vaughan Mills location in Toronto.
Reply from their corporate offices advised that they are concentrating on their US operations at this time with no plans for Canada in the near future.
vancouverguy_76
Active Member
The Bay, Queen Street, is getting a CHANEL Boutique on the 3rd floor???
It appears the Bay on Queen Street will get a significant designer floor shortly. I expect some significant designer leathergoods on the main floor will follow, shortly.
SUNDAY PEOPLE
Bonnie Brooks: Homecoming queen
LUCAS OLENIUK/TORONTO STAR
After 11 years of jet-setting around the world, Brooks has returned to Canada to work her magic on the Bay. Job No. 1: remaking The Room
Jun 07, 2009 04:30 AM
Dana Flavelle
Business Writer
It's mid-week, mid-afternoon on the third floor of the Bay's flagship store in downtown Toronto, and everything is in chaos. The St. Regis Room, home to the $5,000 Balmain jacket and other in-your-dreams garments, is under construction behind temporary white walls. Rack upon rack of less favoured brands crowd the aisles, some marked down by as much as 70 per cent. A handful of bewildered looking seniors wander the floor, looking lost.
Just two floors up in the building at Yonge and Queen, in the executive wing of the Hudson's Bay Co., a smiling, winking, vivacious Bonnie Brooks appears unfazed by it all.
Never mind that department stores across North America are under siege, their long-term decline sharply exacerbated by the economic crisis.
Eight months into her job as president and CEO of Canada's oldest retailer, Brooks leaves you with the impression she has a whole pack of aces up her understated silk Lida Baday jacket sleeve.
"I think HBC is a great brand – it has legs," she says, looking impish, and adding that she's just thought up a bunch of new ideas, none of which she can disclose at the moment. "I haven't even told the (HBC) board of directors yet."
Having bounded from triumph to triumph, first at Fairweather, then at Holt Renfrew – twice – with a detour into fashion magazine publishing as editor of Flare, and finally in Asia as head of The Lane Crawford Joyce Group, Brooks was ready to work her magic again in Canada.
But leading the Bay out of the doldrums may turn out to be the biggest challenge of Brooks' career.
The starting point for her vision seems counter-intuitive. In the midst of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, Brooks wants to move the chain more upscale, starting with the St. Regis Room here at the Bay's stodgy grand dame.
Her plans for "The Room," as it's known colloquially, include blowing it up in size, hiring internationally renowned design firm Yabu Pushelberg to give it a makeover, and stocking it with a wider range of higher-end designers, from Chanel to Juicy Couture and even denim makers Seven and Trash & Luxury.
"It's going to be 22,000 square feet," she says with a smile that invites you to challenge her audacity. That's six times its current footprint.
"I think there's a market for it," Brooks declares, confidently.
Brooks arrived at the Bay last fall, fresh from Hong Kong, where she had spent 11 years building the once dowdy Lane Crawford chain of department stores into a retail empire with 500 shops featuring the latest designer wear.
It was a heady time that included jet-setting around Europe, commanding front-row seats at the biggest fashion shows, and living literally among the clouds on Victoria Peak, the city's most exclusive neighbourhood.
It was there that she tested the formula she now plans to employ at the Bay, hiring Yabu Pushelberg to transform a handful of strategically located Lane Crawford stores into modern retail showpieces and introducing an emerging, upwardly mobile Asian consumer to sought-after Western brands, from Yves St. Laurent to Hugo Boss.
Brooks could have gone anywhere from there. She had several suitors, including Barneys New York and a Paris firm she declines to identify. Instead she chose Canada, a relative backwater in the fashion world, lured by Richard Baker, president and CEO of NRDC Equity Partners, which had just acquired the Hudson's Bay Company. NRDC had deep pockets and big plans.
"It was time to come home," says Brooks, 56, in a matter-of-fact tone that discourages deeper enquiries. She doesn't enjoy being in the spotlight, she says later. But her sister Brenda Sinton and a niece, Kristin Kidd, describe a woman for whom family is hugely important, especially Brooks' mother, Rose, a huge influence.
"She's turning 90 this year," Brooks says of Rose, smiling proudly. "She's just moved in with me."
Brooks, who was married in the 1970s to rock musician Denton Young and has no children, is currently living in Rosedale. But she's hoping to move back to Toronto's Wychwood Park, attracted by the Bathurst-Davenport neighbourhood's combination of a park-like setting with an artists' community.
In the Hudson's Bay boardroom, soapstone carvings, a mounted wolf's head, and a copy of the original charter from King Charles II recall its storied past as a fur-trading company, an image deeply ingrained in Canadians' collective unconscious.
But that illustrious history hasn't helped the Bay evade the same fate as other department stores across North America. You can buy runway knock offs at H&M for a fraction of the price. Best Buy sells more TVs and consumer electronics than department stores and everyone from Home Depot to Future Shop now competes in appliances.
It's hard to imagine how the 94-store Bay can successfully reinvent itself.
"If anybody can do it, Bonnie can," says George Yabu, partner and co-founder of Toronto-based Yabu Pushelberg, whose clients include Tiffany & Co., the Four Seasons and other luxury brands. "She's incredible. She's got balls. She loves to rise to the challenge.
"She's able to, without any coercion or hard sell, attract and inspire. That's one of her greatest talents. She gets you excited, and you want to make it work for her as much as for herself.
"We love working with Bonnie," Yabu says of his firm's decision to take on The Room, its first retail project in Canada in years. "She'll let us take risks because she does. A lot of Canadians are hard to work with. They're very reticent. They'll say: `Are you sure we can pull this off?'"
Another "un-Canadian" aspect of Brooks' style is her inability to take no for an answer, Yabu says.
"She'll find a way, without denigrating herself or anyone else, to get in there and see the right person. If she doesn't get a meeting with the president or the main marketing person for the brand, she'll find a way to get them out for a drink or dinner. That's what I love about her."
From an early age, Brooks was energetic and determined, says her sister Brenda, a retired teacher who lives in Alliston, Ont.Born eight and 11 years after her two older sisters, Brooks was raised more like an only child, used to interacting in an adult environment, Brenda says.
"Bonnie is a very high-energy person and always has been. When she locks onto something she will not let it go until she has attained what she set out to do."
The Brooks girls were raised in a comfortable middle-class home in London, Ont. Their father, Gordon, was a general manager at Domtar, the pulp and paper company, while their mother, Rose, worked in banking.
But it was her mother's flair for fashion and design that sparked Brooks' interest in the field.
"I'd always been interested in fashion in high school," Brooks recalls. " I was very interested in design and sewing; I made my own clothes. My mother was instrumental in that. She was an incredible seamstress. She made my sisters' formal dresses for all their proms and formal parties.
"My mother wore European clothes. She had somebody who shopped for her who owned a little store in London (Ont.) but did the shopping in Europe for her. My mother never went to Europe."
Until later, when Brooks was able to parlay her position into a special treat for her mom.
"I took her to a Karl Lagerfeld fashion show in Paris. My mother was in her 70s. That was really fun, really fun. It was her first time to Paris."
Brooks' passion became her vocation in 1973. While travelling through Europe after university, she landed a job at Biba, one of the hottest shops in the U.K. at the height of the Carnaby Street craze.
"It was a very exciting time in retailing," she says.
After six months at Biba, Brooks returned to Toronto and got an interview with Mary McCrae, head of advertising and promotion at Fairweather, part of the Dylex empire, once Canada's biggest specialty retail firm. McCrae became her mentor.
"I think it was the way I was dressed," Brooks says. "I was in London Carnaby Street. A long striped cardigan sweater. I had on the big huge platforms, the latest five-inch platform heels, skinny pants or maybe a miniskirt."
McCrae, now in her late 60s and retired from her final post as dean of Ryerson University's school of fashion, watched as first Woodward's, then Simpsons, then Eaton's all disappeared from the department store landscape.
Still, she says, she can see that Brooks is already making a difference at the Bay, and not just in the downtown stores.
"I see more style in the merchandise and the advertising," McCrae says.
"I'm sure she's motivating her staff to be more edgy, more creative.
"If she can get the right lines and the right marketing and promotion, she can get people excited again."
From: http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/article/646819
It appears the Bay on Queen Street will get a significant designer floor shortly. I expect some significant designer leathergoods on the main floor will follow, shortly.
SUNDAY PEOPLE
Bonnie Brooks: Homecoming queen
LUCAS OLENIUK/TORONTO STAR
After 11 years of jet-setting around the world, Brooks has returned to Canada to work her magic on the Bay. Job No. 1: remaking The Room
Jun 07, 2009 04:30 AM
Dana Flavelle
Business Writer
It's mid-week, mid-afternoon on the third floor of the Bay's flagship store in downtown Toronto, and everything is in chaos. The St. Regis Room, home to the $5,000 Balmain jacket and other in-your-dreams garments, is under construction behind temporary white walls. Rack upon rack of less favoured brands crowd the aisles, some marked down by as much as 70 per cent. A handful of bewildered looking seniors wander the floor, looking lost.
Just two floors up in the building at Yonge and Queen, in the executive wing of the Hudson's Bay Co., a smiling, winking, vivacious Bonnie Brooks appears unfazed by it all.
Never mind that department stores across North America are under siege, their long-term decline sharply exacerbated by the economic crisis.
Eight months into her job as president and CEO of Canada's oldest retailer, Brooks leaves you with the impression she has a whole pack of aces up her understated silk Lida Baday jacket sleeve.
"I think HBC is a great brand – it has legs," she says, looking impish, and adding that she's just thought up a bunch of new ideas, none of which she can disclose at the moment. "I haven't even told the (HBC) board of directors yet."
Having bounded from triumph to triumph, first at Fairweather, then at Holt Renfrew – twice – with a detour into fashion magazine publishing as editor of Flare, and finally in Asia as head of The Lane Crawford Joyce Group, Brooks was ready to work her magic again in Canada.
But leading the Bay out of the doldrums may turn out to be the biggest challenge of Brooks' career.
The starting point for her vision seems counter-intuitive. In the midst of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, Brooks wants to move the chain more upscale, starting with the St. Regis Room here at the Bay's stodgy grand dame.
Her plans for "The Room," as it's known colloquially, include blowing it up in size, hiring internationally renowned design firm Yabu Pushelberg to give it a makeover, and stocking it with a wider range of higher-end designers, from Chanel to Juicy Couture and even denim makers Seven and Trash & Luxury.
"It's going to be 22,000 square feet," she says with a smile that invites you to challenge her audacity. That's six times its current footprint.
"I think there's a market for it," Brooks declares, confidently.
Brooks arrived at the Bay last fall, fresh from Hong Kong, where she had spent 11 years building the once dowdy Lane Crawford chain of department stores into a retail empire with 500 shops featuring the latest designer wear.
It was a heady time that included jet-setting around Europe, commanding front-row seats at the biggest fashion shows, and living literally among the clouds on Victoria Peak, the city's most exclusive neighbourhood.
It was there that she tested the formula she now plans to employ at the Bay, hiring Yabu Pushelberg to transform a handful of strategically located Lane Crawford stores into modern retail showpieces and introducing an emerging, upwardly mobile Asian consumer to sought-after Western brands, from Yves St. Laurent to Hugo Boss.
Brooks could have gone anywhere from there. She had several suitors, including Barneys New York and a Paris firm she declines to identify. Instead she chose Canada, a relative backwater in the fashion world, lured by Richard Baker, president and CEO of NRDC Equity Partners, which had just acquired the Hudson's Bay Company. NRDC had deep pockets and big plans.
"It was time to come home," says Brooks, 56, in a matter-of-fact tone that discourages deeper enquiries. She doesn't enjoy being in the spotlight, she says later. But her sister Brenda Sinton and a niece, Kristin Kidd, describe a woman for whom family is hugely important, especially Brooks' mother, Rose, a huge influence.
"She's turning 90 this year," Brooks says of Rose, smiling proudly. "She's just moved in with me."
Brooks, who was married in the 1970s to rock musician Denton Young and has no children, is currently living in Rosedale. But she's hoping to move back to Toronto's Wychwood Park, attracted by the Bathurst-Davenport neighbourhood's combination of a park-like setting with an artists' community.
In the Hudson's Bay boardroom, soapstone carvings, a mounted wolf's head, and a copy of the original charter from King Charles II recall its storied past as a fur-trading company, an image deeply ingrained in Canadians' collective unconscious.
But that illustrious history hasn't helped the Bay evade the same fate as other department stores across North America. You can buy runway knock offs at H&M for a fraction of the price. Best Buy sells more TVs and consumer electronics than department stores and everyone from Home Depot to Future Shop now competes in appliances.
It's hard to imagine how the 94-store Bay can successfully reinvent itself.
"If anybody can do it, Bonnie can," says George Yabu, partner and co-founder of Toronto-based Yabu Pushelberg, whose clients include Tiffany & Co., the Four Seasons and other luxury brands. "She's incredible. She's got balls. She loves to rise to the challenge.
"She's able to, without any coercion or hard sell, attract and inspire. That's one of her greatest talents. She gets you excited, and you want to make it work for her as much as for herself.
"We love working with Bonnie," Yabu says of his firm's decision to take on The Room, its first retail project in Canada in years. "She'll let us take risks because she does. A lot of Canadians are hard to work with. They're very reticent. They'll say: `Are you sure we can pull this off?'"
Another "un-Canadian" aspect of Brooks' style is her inability to take no for an answer, Yabu says.
"She'll find a way, without denigrating herself or anyone else, to get in there and see the right person. If she doesn't get a meeting with the president or the main marketing person for the brand, she'll find a way to get them out for a drink or dinner. That's what I love about her."
From an early age, Brooks was energetic and determined, says her sister Brenda, a retired teacher who lives in Alliston, Ont.Born eight and 11 years after her two older sisters, Brooks was raised more like an only child, used to interacting in an adult environment, Brenda says.
"Bonnie is a very high-energy person and always has been. When she locks onto something she will not let it go until she has attained what she set out to do."
The Brooks girls were raised in a comfortable middle-class home in London, Ont. Their father, Gordon, was a general manager at Domtar, the pulp and paper company, while their mother, Rose, worked in banking.
But it was her mother's flair for fashion and design that sparked Brooks' interest in the field.
"I'd always been interested in fashion in high school," Brooks recalls. " I was very interested in design and sewing; I made my own clothes. My mother was instrumental in that. She was an incredible seamstress. She made my sisters' formal dresses for all their proms and formal parties.
"My mother wore European clothes. She had somebody who shopped for her who owned a little store in London (Ont.) but did the shopping in Europe for her. My mother never went to Europe."
Until later, when Brooks was able to parlay her position into a special treat for her mom.
"I took her to a Karl Lagerfeld fashion show in Paris. My mother was in her 70s. That was really fun, really fun. It was her first time to Paris."
Brooks' passion became her vocation in 1973. While travelling through Europe after university, she landed a job at Biba, one of the hottest shops in the U.K. at the height of the Carnaby Street craze.
"It was a very exciting time in retailing," she says.
After six months at Biba, Brooks returned to Toronto and got an interview with Mary McCrae, head of advertising and promotion at Fairweather, part of the Dylex empire, once Canada's biggest specialty retail firm. McCrae became her mentor.
"I think it was the way I was dressed," Brooks says. "I was in London Carnaby Street. A long striped cardigan sweater. I had on the big huge platforms, the latest five-inch platform heels, skinny pants or maybe a miniskirt."
McCrae, now in her late 60s and retired from her final post as dean of Ryerson University's school of fashion, watched as first Woodward's, then Simpsons, then Eaton's all disappeared from the department store landscape.
Still, she says, she can see that Brooks is already making a difference at the Bay, and not just in the downtown stores.
"I see more style in the merchandise and the advertising," McCrae says.
"I'm sure she's motivating her staff to be more edgy, more creative.
"If she can get the right lines and the right marketing and promotion, she can get people excited again."
From: http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/article/646819
prosperegal
Senior Member
^^^
If they sell Seven, Paige, Joe's etc....maybe they'll actually have petite sizes. I think right now, there are only two or three places where you can get the Joe's Provocateurs (the petite length - 31" inseam with (I think) an 8" rise (i.e. shorter inseam and shorter rise - great for petite to average heighted women))...and one of the stores is past 16th. Even Rainbow doesn't carry them. Several sales associates looked at me as if I were a nut case when I asked. They went on and on trying to sell me their alterations service. Sorry, I'd rather have less baggy jeans (as alterations will still make "regular" length denim baggier on 5'2" me)
If they sell Seven, Paige, Joe's etc....maybe they'll actually have petite sizes. I think right now, there are only two or three places where you can get the Joe's Provocateurs (the petite length - 31" inseam with (I think) an 8" rise (i.e. shorter inseam and shorter rise - great for petite to average heighted women))...and one of the stores is past 16th. Even Rainbow doesn't carry them. Several sales associates looked at me as if I were a nut case when I asked. They went on and on trying to sell me their alterations service. Sorry, I'd rather have less baggy jeans (as alterations will still make "regular" length denim baggier on 5'2" me)
vancouverguy_76
Active Member
Hey Torontonians! Has anyone been to the Bay on Queen Street recently? I'm curious how the renovations are going. If anyone has a camera, snap a few photos and post them
I just got back from the Bay in downtown Vancouver. They've already renovated women's shoes. STUNNING department. new flooring and light, lovely furniture and decorating. It's a bright, classy black-and-white theme. Very Yabu Pushelberg. My friend and I were shocked... if the entire store is re-made to this look and service picks up, I'm DEFINITELY going to shop there more often.
I dare say that the new shoe floor is architecturally more interesting than Vancouver's Holt Renfrew. I'm very excited for what's in store for the Toronto Queen Street store. I expect the main floor will include some significant designer shops (possibly Vuitton, Prada, Chanel, etc.).
I also wonder if this thread should be re-named, something to the effect of "Flagship Bay Store Transformations".
I just got back from the Bay in downtown Vancouver. They've already renovated women's shoes. STUNNING department. new flooring and light, lovely furniture and decorating. It's a bright, classy black-and-white theme. Very Yabu Pushelberg. My friend and I were shocked... if the entire store is re-made to this look and service picks up, I'm DEFINITELY going to shop there more often.
I dare say that the new shoe floor is architecturally more interesting than Vancouver's Holt Renfrew. I'm very excited for what's in store for the Toronto Queen Street store. I expect the main floor will include some significant designer shops (possibly Vuitton, Prada, Chanel, etc.).
I also wonder if this thread should be re-named, something to the effect of "Flagship Bay Store Transformations".
Last edited:
alklay
Senior Member
I walk through the Queen Street Bay store every day and I see no sign of renovations. In fact, the first floor is a sad dawdy mess. And the store is almost always empty.
Every time I walk through the place the same thought occurs to me: "Its amazing that this place is still open."
Every time I walk through the place the same thought occurs to me: "Its amazing that this place is still open."
DavidJamesTO
Active Member
Strange; whenever I'm there it's quite crowded.
I know they're working on the first floor, but I don't think the ground floor's had anything done yet. Renovations on the facade don't seem to be going anywhere.
I know they're working on the first floor, but I don't think the ground floor's had anything done yet. Renovations on the facade don't seem to be going anywhere.