Parent company of Saks Fifth Avenue to buy rival Neiman Marcus

The genitor institution of Saks Fifth Avenue has signed a woody to bargain upscale rival Neiman Marcus for $2.65 billion

NEW YORK -- The genitor institution of Saks Fifth Avenue has signed a woody to bargain upscale rival Neiman Marcus for $2.65 billion.

The caller entity would beryllium called Saks Global, which volition comprise the Saks Fifth Avenue and Saks OFF 5TH brands, Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman, arsenic good arsenic the existent property assets of Neiman Marcus Group and HBC, a holding institution that purchased Saks successful 2013.

The pact was announced Thursday aft months of rumors that the section store chains had been negotiating a deal.

The Wall Street Journal archetypal reported the impending woody Wednesday.

Both Saks and Neiman Marcus person struggled arsenic shoppers person been pulling backmost connected buying high-end goods and shifting their spending toward experiences, similar question and upscale restaurants. The 2 iconic luxury purveyors person besides faced stiffer contention from luxury brands, which are progressively opening their ain stores. The woody would assistance trim operating costs and make much negotiating powerfulness with vendors.

Saks Fifth Avenue presently operates 39 stores successful the U.S., including its Manhattan flagship. In aboriginal 2021, Saks spun disconnected its website into a abstracted company, with the hopes of expanding that concern astatine a clip erstwhile much radical were buying online.

Neiman Marcus filed for bankruptcy protection successful May 2020 during the archetypal months of the coronavirus pandemic but emerged successful September of that year. Like galore of its peers, the privately held section store concatenation was forced to temporarily adjacent its stores for respective months.

Meanwhile, different section stores are nether unit to support expanding sales.

Storied Lord & Taylor announced successful precocious August 2020 it was closing each its stores aft filing for bankruptcy earlier that month. It's operating online. Macy’s announced successful February of this twelvemonth that it volition adjacent 150 unproductive namesake stores implicit the adjacent 3 years including 50 by year-end.

Consumers person proven resilient and willing to shop adjacent aft a bout of inflation, though behaviors person shifted, with immoderate Americans trading down to lower-priced goods.

A woody betwixt the 2 luxury retailers does not resoluteness each the issues, particularly erstwhile high-end shoppers are looking to bargain luxury goods online oregon astatine luxury brands' ain stores, Saunders said.

“As a larger entity, negotiating powerfulness volition beryllium a small amended with the brands, but adjacent a combined concatenation would not lucifer the heft and powerfulness of the planetary luxury conglomerates, which would inactive clasp astir of the cards,” Saunders said. “As such, determination is simply a hazard that the woody mightiness extremity up creating an adjacent bigger headache for Saks.”