Dive Brief:
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Gap Inc. is closing its online unit Piperlime ahead of Art Peck taking over as CEO next month.
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Gap started Piperlime in 2006 as an online-only shoe store and later added more fashion apparel and accessories. Although it opened a physical store in New York City in 2012, the brand was essentially web-only.
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Piperlime made up less than 1% of Gap Inc. revenue with annual sales under $100 million, the company has said.
Dive Insight:
Piperlime was both a shoe experiment and a web experiment for Gap Inc., and its closure may be an indication that both were tricky areas. Web sales of shoes can be hard to master, with high return rates because so much depends on customers trying them on. And Piperlime never gained the brand identity its parent enjoys.
“We plan to keep on pushing new ideas and look forward to seeing how we can apply what we’ve learned to the rest of the company,” Peck said in the statement.
