Who Will Buy?

Barneys New York announced today the scheduled opening of Barneys New York Co-Op stores in South Coast Plaza, Costa Mesa, Calif., and Phipps Plaza, Atlanta.

The South Coast Plaza location will consist of approximately 8600 square feet and the Phipps Plaza location of approximately 7000 square feet. Both stores are scheduled to open in the first quarter of fiscal 2005.

“We are excited that our first mall-based Co-Op stores will be located in South Coast Plaza and Phipps Plaza, as both are among the finest retail centers in the country.” said chairman, president and ceo Howard Sokol. “Both locations will carry an assortment of men’s and women’s apparel, accessories, shoes and cosmetics that is reflective of the merchandise in our flagship store Co-Op departments and in our other freestanding Co-Op locations. These two locations represent the latest development in our strategy to grow our Co-Op concept and follows the opening of Co-Op stores in the Chelsea and SoHo sections of New York [and] the South Beach section of Miami, as well as the recent announcement of Co-Op stores opening on the Upper West Side of New York and in Chicago.”

In the meantime, speculation continued as to potential buyers of the luxury retailer a month after Barneys’ executives announced a search for a new owner might be underway. Whippoorwill Associates and Bay Harbour Management, the two investor groups that paid about $240 million for a majority stake in the luxury fashion retailer when it came out of bankruptcy protection in 1999, have indicated (according to The New York Times) that they expect it to go for at least $400 million, a sum that represents its current value on the Nasdaq market, but perhaps even $500 million or so. The stakes have risen with the rise of the luxury market and the $3.2 billion The May Department Store Co. (St. Louis) recently paid for the Marshall Field’s department store chain.

“The brand must be very strong,’’ said Sokol. “If it could take a punch like it did in the 90s and come back, the opportunity now will be very special.’’

The Times says the challenge is finding the right fit: a buyer who believes in Barneys’ potential to grow nationally, in its ability to stay on the forward edge of fashion, and in the continued escalation of the luxury market. “It has to be a culture match,’’ menswear designer Joseph Abboud told The Times. “A Neiman Marcus would be perfect; Saks might want to expand. A Tiffany or Cartier, or an LVMH. But I’d say a strategic investor, like another retailer.’’ The Times says other insiders point to Federated Department Stores (Cincinnati), which opted out of the Marshall Field’s bidding war, and is said to have millions in cash.

Other experts, however, say that Barneys may not be a good fit for another retailer or a maker of luxury goods. “It will be a financial buyer, an equity group,’’ said Emanuel Weintraub, a retail management consultant. Barneys is “a niche story,’’ he added. Among those who might fit that bill, other industry experts said, are Philip Miller, the former ceo of Saks Fifth Avenue (now an executive in an equity firm), and Peter Rizzo, a former Bergdorf Goodman executive who now heads IC Isaacs, the parent of Girbaud jeans.