VF Corporation, best known as the owner of Vans, has decided to part ways with its Dickies brand.
According to reports, the company is selling the classic workwear label to Bluestar Alliance in a $600 million cash deal that should wrap up by the end of 2025.
VF originally bought Dickies in 2017 for $820 million, hoping to grow the brand’s global presence. But in recent years, Dickies has been slipping.
Sales peaked in 2022 when revenue jumped above $800 million, but things have been heading downhill since. This past year, revenue dropped to about $542 million, continuing a steady decline.
The company tried to shake things up by moving Dickies’ headquarters from its longtime home in Fort Worth, Texas, to Southern California, where it could sit alongside Vans.
The move also brought layoffs of around 120 employees. Last year, VF tapped Chris Goble as the new brand president to steer Dickies back toward its workwear roots after drifting too far into lifestyle fashion. Still, the turnaround hasn’t been enough for VF to hold on.
For VF, selling Dickies is mostly about money. The company has been under pressure to cut down its $9 billion debt load, and unloading Dickies frees up cash to do exactly that.
VF has already sold other brands in recent years, including Supreme in 2024, as it narrows its focus on the parts of the business that are performing best.
On the other side of the deal, Bluestar Alliance sees an opportunity. The investment firm owns or licenses several well-known brands, including Hurley, Off-White, Palm Angels, Scotch & Soda, Brookstone, Bebe, and Tahari.
Adding Dickies gives Bluestar another established name it can plug into its licensing system, which stretches across more than 500 stores worldwide.
Bluestar CEO Joseph Gabbay called Dickies a legendary workwear brand and said the company is excited to help bring it back to growth. Exactly what that looks like is still unclear, especially for Dickies’ leadership and employees, but Bluestar is expected to lean on its experience managing consumer brands across multiple markets.
The deal still needs regulatory approval, but both companies are confident it will close by the end of the year.
That means Dickies, founded in 1922 and long associated with sturdy, reliable work clothes, will soon have a new home, while VF Corporation continues to reshape its business and work on digging out of debt.