Express

### Area Served

United States, Canada (online only), Puerto Rico, Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, El Salvador

### Parent

Limited Brands

**Express, Inc.** is an American fashion retailer that caters mainly to young men and women. The company is owned by Limited Brands. Express operated 635 stores in the United States and Puerto Rico in 2017. As of February 1, 2020, there were 607 stores in the U.S., Puerto Rico, Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, El Salvador and Guatemala.

## History

Limited Brands, in 1980, opened the first Express store, as women's clothier "Limited Express" in Chicago's Water Tower Place. Former CEO Michael Weiss joined the brand in 1981 when the test expanded to include eight stores. By 1986, Express had 250 stores and began testing the sale of men's merchandise in 16 stores the following year. The men's fashion line was spun off into its own brand, Structure, in 1989.

In 2001, Express became a dual gender brand with the reintegration of its Structure stores as "Express Men". Dual gender Express stores began opening the following year. Structure apparel brand was sold to Sears in 2003.

In November 2019, Express announced spinoff UpWest, a DTC lifestyle brand geared towards health, wellness, and sustainability. With the launch of UpWest also came its philanthropic arm, The UpWest Foundation, which will donate 1% of total sales up to $1million towards Mental Health America, Random Acts and Freedom Dogs of America.

## Styles

In 2005, Express introduced a denim line, with a stitching on the back pockets called DPD. In 2006, Express introduced the King of Prides collection for men, which includes denim, T-shirts, and hooded sweaters.

In April 2008, Express released a limited women's collection designed by Celia Birtwell. In early 2009, replacing the discontinued DPD jeans; Express introduced its newest denim line, Rerocks, in both women's and in men. Just like the DPD jeans, Rerocks also have stitching on the back pockets and the materials are different.

In 2009, Express denim line was expanded with its extra low-rise Zelda jeans as well as introducing two new styles. One is a women's denim, barely boot-cut in either the low-rise Zelda or the regular-rise Stella. The other is the men's denim Zach, which is an extra-slim fit.

Express jeans come in different washes from darkest to lightest and fits from loose to tight.

For women's denim: **Mia** styles: slim fit with a mid rise, **Zelda** styles: slim fit with an ultra low rise, **Stella** styles: regular fit with low rise jeans, **Rerock** styles: thick-stitched jeans

For men's denim: **Blake** styles: loose fit **Kingston** styles: classic fit, tighter fitting than the Blake and looser than the Rocco or Zach, **Rocco** styles: slim fit **Alec** styles: extra slim fit

Today the jeans are characterized by fit. For women, the styles are Skinny, Legging, Barely Boot, Classic and Cropped. Men's jeans are classified by three general fits: Skinny, Slim and Classic.

Express clothes are designed at the Express Design Studio on 111 Fifth Avenue New York City, New York in Manhattan's Flatiron District.

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