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Abercrombie &Fitch Co$.$ wowed Wall Street when it turned around its namesake brand, partly by shifting its focus

from teenagers to adult women. Now the company will find out if it can give a similar boost to its Hollister brand as it

sticks with high$-$schoolers.

Hollister for many years eclipsed the Abercrombie chain in revenue, but saw sales fall during Covid$-19$ in $2020$ and

again, postpandemic, in $2022.$ Abercrombie, meanwhile, has notched three consecutive years of sales growth,

surpassing the Hollister chain last year for the first time since $2010.$

Hollister is tweaking its edges rather than its core to make itself more relevant to the notoriously mercurial teenage

shopper, according to Carey Collins Krug, Abercrombie &Fitch's chief marketing officer.

$"$It was a little bit more of$,$ let's re$-$engage and reconnect with who this customer is now postpandemic," Collins Krug

said.

Hollister this month is introducing a back$-$to$-$school campaign featuring $22-$year$-$old singer Benson Boone and funded

by a marketing budget increased at the end of $2023.$

Reigniting marketing

The campaign will include TikTok ads using a new song from Boone and Spotify ads voiced by Jvke, another Gen$-$Z

musician. Some ads will run on Snapchat and Pinterest to capitalize on the "First Day Fit Check" trend in which

students post back$-$to$-$school outfits on social media.

The retailer later this year will introduce the Hollister Style Hub, a program that rewards influencers for completing

"challenges," which usually involve posting photos featuring Hollister items.

The new marketing follows several years of work to reduce the use of discounts and promotions, manage inventory

levels and design items better suited to contemporary $17-$year$-$olds.

That turned out to mean comfy clothes.

$"$If it's not comfortable, they're not wearing it$,"$ Collins Krug said. "The entire world leaned into more of a comfortable

lifestyle simply because of the life that the pandemic offered all of us$.$ But this demographic was really like, 'I am

never going back.$\text{'}"$

Fleece tops and bottoms are leading Hollister's growth in its men's division, Abercrombie &Fitch Chief Executive

Fran Horowitz said on the company's latest earnings call in May.

Hollister's annual sales, which include activewear brand Gilly Hicks, rose $6\%$ last year and $12\%$ in the first quarter,

but have yet to regain prepandemic levels.

Designers are also trying to inject comfort into garments' details and designs, Collins Krug said. Teenage girls told

Hollister they can feel uncomfortable wearing dresses throughout a day of classes, for example.

$"$So we introduced shorts underneath the dress," Collins Krug said, adding that women's dresses also come with

pockets. Some men's pants also now feature a front$-$pocket zipper to help keep phones from falling out, she added.

"It's just those little details to say, like, oh$,$ we actually really understand you," Collins Krug said.

On$-$trend pricing

Some of Hollister's offerings lean into current trends such as "Peak Girlhood," or "living in bows, lace and pops of

pink all summer long," as the brand puts it$.$ There is also $"2000$s Fit Check," delivered by Hollister in the form of

apparel including "future$-$vintage baggy jeans, heavyweight boxy tees and plaid shirts."

Hollister's bona fides as a brand that launched in $2000$ have helped it capitalize on the current Y $2$ K trend in a way

that other companies haven't, said Andrew Roth, the $25-$year$-$old founder and CEO of Gen Z research and strategy

firm DCDX$.$

Hollister's pricing is also becoming more popular with Gen Z$,$ Roth said.

"They're not a $$5$ quick ship from Shein or Temu, but they're also not like the other end, which is kind of the more

accessible luxury that's being targeted at young people now with Coach and with some of these other luxury

brands," Roth said. $"$In maybe $2022$ it felt like we were squeezing out that middle, but now it's coming back in and it

seems to be what young people are really gravitating towards."

Hollister in the fall will bring back its Feel Good Fest, a series of concerts first held in high schools to promote the

brand to young people. The concerts also allow Hollister researchers to mingle among teenagers to learn what they

want in their wardrobes and figure out how they look to style their clothes, Collins Krug said. She added that she

hopes to expand the concert series beyond high schools.

The question remains whether Hollister can aspire to the $31\%$ growth reported by the Abercrombie brand in the first

quarter.

Some analysts say they anticipate modest growth given the less dramatic shift in strategy. abercrombie declined to comment on its forecast for specific brands, but in may increased its full year outlook for overall net sales growth net sales growth around $10\%$ from a previous range $4\%$ to $6\%$