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New York – Ivanka Trump announced on Tuesday that she would end the activities of her clothing, footwear and accessories brand, whose development she had limited to avoid conflicts of interest with her role as Home Counselor white.
After experiencing a sharp rise in sales in 2016 in favor of the presidential campaign, the brand had suffered the impact of the election of Donald Trump, several retail chains deciding in particular to dereference it.
" After 17 months in Washington, I do not know if I will resume this activity one day, but I know that until further notice, my attention is focused on what I am doing here ", Ivanka Trump explained in a statement sent to AFP.
" This decision is the only right way for my team and my badociates ," she added. The 18 employees of the company will be fired.
Launched in its current form in 2014, the brand benefited from a partnership with the G-III Apparel Group, which manufactured and distributed clothing and accessories.
Positioned in the mid-range segment, at affordable prices, it achieved a turnover of 47.3 million dollars in the 2016/17 financial year, closed at the end of January 2017, up 61% , according to figures published by G-III.
After her father's election and appointment as a White House counselor, this mother of three had retained her majority interest in the mark but paid into a trust to minimize the risk of conflict. interest.
A source close to the mark recalled that after the creation of the trust, the company had worked with a specialist to ensure that it complied with the recommendations of the Office of Government Ethics (OGE) and had " took measures that went beyond the legal provisions ".
However, several Congressional officials regularly expressed concern about the potential for conflict of interest posed by Ivanka Trump's involvement in her society.
After being alerted by the Law Commission of the House of Representatives, the brand had renounced, in 2017, a partnership with the Japanese textile group Sanei, one of whose shareholders was, indirectly, the Japanese State .
In late May 2018, the American anti-corruption badociation Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (Crew) noted that Ivanka Trump was granted trademark registration by China a few days before Donald Trump do not let go of the weight on the file of the Chinese telecom equipment manufacturer ZTE.
– A Broken Image –
Traditionally, the brand's activities abroad were closely watched and often suspected of benefiting from the influence of the Trump clan.
In May 2017, three Chinese activists were arrested in China while investigating factories producing shoes for the Ivanka Trump line. Detained for several weeks, they were released at the end of June 2017.
After a time incarnated the voice of reason in the Trump clan, able to push his father to moderate his position on certain issues, she saw her image deteriorate, criticized for its inaction and its lack of impact on the Trump administration.
Since the inauguration of Donald Trump, several chain stores, including Nordstrom and Neiman Marcus in the United States and Hudson Bay in Canada, have chosen not to sell items bearing the name of the president's daughter. -United.
The decision to stop his activities " has nothing to do with the performance of the mark and is solely related to Ivanka's decision to remain in Washington until further notice ", said a source close to the mark.
" The structure of the brand was built on a growth model ", nevertheless added this source. The departure of the founder for Washington and restrictions on the brand to avoid conflicts of interest " limited its ability to grow, in the United States or abroad ", making its development difficult .
" Perceptions of the brand are now very polarized and she became a lightning rod for protest and boycott ," said Neil Saunders, director of GlobalData Retail.
" Even though society is still viable ," he added, " the pursuit of his business became much more complicated and these problems would only have increased ] ".
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