CONCEPT ONE ACCESSORIES BUYS DREW PEARSON

Concept One Accessories purchased the assets of Drew Pearson Marketing Inc. from Mainland Headwear Holdings Ltd, a publicly held headwear firm in Hong Kong (they were Drew Pearson’s biggest source of production) for $8m in cash.

The merger makes Concept One a $90m headwear and bag firm - $70million comes from headwear sales. Concept One also acquired Block Headwear, The Helen Welsh Group and SlickCase, the maker of iPod accessories.

“We are well positioned to absorb this deal and in nine months we will pursue additional companies in related categories with strong market niches,” said Sam Hafif, chief executive officer of Concept One. “We are well on our way to meet our plan for $150m in sales by 2010.”

Mainland sold Drew Pearson to concentrate on manufacturing and to eliminate potential conflicts of interest with other US-based customers. A separate manufacturing agreement was inked for Mainland to build a 125,000-square-foot factory staffed with 1,500 employees to handle Concept One and Drew Pearson’s woven headwear.

Concept One headwear brands include: Southpole, Levi Strauss Red Tab, US Polo Association, Original Penguin and Akademiks, some movies and the television show “24.” DPM has licensing relationships with Nascar, The Walt Disney Co, Warner Brothers, Budweiser and General Mills.

Sam and Bernie Hafif founded Concept One in 1999.

From: just-style.com