Wal-Mart Stores in talks to acquire Bonobos menswear retailer

by Kim Souza ([email protected]) 833 views 

Recode reports Wal-Mart Stores is in advanced rounds of another acquisition. This time, the retail giant is looking east at New York-based Bonobos, a menswear e-tailer founded in 2007 by Andy Dunn and Brian Spaly.

The higher-end fashion retailer also sells men’s fashion through Nordstrom in addition to its own website. Dunn is the CEO and Spaly left Bonobos to start Trunk Club which he sold to Nordstroms in 2014.

Walmart U.S. e-commerce CEO Marc Lore recently said the retailer is behind and his job is to catch up, which will likely happen with more acquisitions. In his seven month tenure at the retail giant, Lore has spearheaded three other acquisitions in special product categories and he’s restructured the Walmart.com and Jet.com businesses to take advantage of category expertise from Moosejaw, ShoeBuy, Modcloth and Hayneedle, which was part of the Jet.com deal.

Recode reports the two parties have already settled on a price, which they believe will surpass the $70 million paid for ShoeBuy. Bonobos has reported annual revenue around $125 million.

While Bonobos is primarily an online business, the retailer has opened nearly three dozen brick-and-mortar showrooms where customers can get properly fitted and place orders which are then delivered to them at home. These “guideshops” are located in larger urban cities such as Atlanta, Austin, Bethesda, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Minneapolis, Nashville, Newport Beach, New York City, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Jose, San Francisco, Seattle, Scottsdale and Washington D.C. The website said future locations are planned in Los Angeles, Denver and Lexington, Kentucky.

Wal-Mart has not responded to the reports, but Lore has told the media the retailer was actively looking to make more deals. The retailer will no doubt report on the deal once due diligence is finalized.

Talk Business & Politics will follow up on this story as more details are known.