Firm is betting parkas are the new handbag

Moose Knuckles, maker of outerwear, has grown by 50% over five years

He describes the luxury apparel market as a three-legged stool: Handbags, footwear and — the up-and-comer — outerwear.

It’s that last leg that has industry veteran Victor Luis investing in Canadian upscale parka and sportswear brand Moose Knuckles.

“Outerwear is a $10 billion or more global opportunity that is highly fragmented,” says Luis, the former CEO of Tapestry, Inc., parent company of luxury apparel juggernauts Coach, Kate Spade and Stuart Weitzman, in a video interview from New York.

“There’s a lot of little brands, but only one or two big brands. The opportunity for us to take market share and grow with the tremendous amount of energy that is behind the category and truly become a leader in the space is very substantial.”

Luis was named executive chair of Moose Knuckles this month after making a “significant investment” in the private company, joining institutional investor Cathay Capital as an operating partner.

For co-ceos Noah Stern and Ayal Twik, the backing from a titan of fashion serves as a vote of confidence in the brand.

Moose Knuckles has grown by 50 per cent for the past five years, with a nearly triple-digit increase in direct-to-consumer sales in the past year alone.

The Montreal-based parka maker is available in more than 30 countries at premium department store chains like Selfridges, Holt Renfrew, Saks Fifth Avenue, Isetan and Lane Crawford.

It’s also steadily building out its own stand-alone retail locations. Moose Knuckles opened its flagship store at Toronto’s Yorkdale Shopping Centre in 2017 — right across from competitor Canada Goose — and now has 11 brick-and-mortar locations.

While the brand operates in the same space as companies like Canada Goose and Nobis, Moose Knuckles markets to a more “youthful audience,” Twik says.

The idea is to make outerwear that serves as “the new handbag” for the next generation of luxury shoppers, he says.

Part of the equation is perfecting its parkas, jackets and bombers. The challenge for the company’s design and engineering team was to make the warmest coat on the market that doesn’t look like a sleeping bag, Stern says.

“They found a way to deliver what is rated as the warmest parka among our competition in the world,” says Stern, who started in the apparel industry at the age of eight working in the shipping room of his family’s Winnipeg outerwear factory. “But it still has a very sexy, modern, tailored fit.”

The parkas range in price from $995 all the way up to $1,424 for the women’s Mont Joli parka, which comes with a 24K gold-plated Moose Knuckles logo.

The company’s sportswear starts at about $120 for a T-shirt or hat up to about $390 for a zip-up hoodie sweater.