FOSSIL

Fossil, Inc., the owner of one of the most well-known brand names in the United States, creates, markets, and distributes fashion timepieces, leather goods, sunglasses, and other things for retail sale worldwide. During the 1980s, Fossil flourished swiftly, owing to its retro watch designs, which were influenced by magazine advertising from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. During the 1990s, the firm explored foreign markets and broadened its product range to include leather items and sunglasses after seeing exceptional success with its timepieces in the United States. In addition to selling products under the Fossil brand, the business also sold Relic timepieces, which were less costly than Fossil watches.

Fossil, founded in 1984 by Tom Kartsotis, a Texas A&M dropout residing in Dallas, was his second business venture. Kartsotis and a colleague ran a ticket brokerage firm in Dallas when he was in his early twenties, where the two entrepreneurs had some success selling tickets to Dallas Cowboy football games and other events. But, a decade after launching the company that would propel him to fame and fortune, Kartsotis told Forbes, "I didn't want to be a 30-year-old ticket scalper."

Kartsotis was inspired to start his second firm after his older brother, Kosta Kartsotis, a merchandising executive at Sanger Harris, a prominent Dallas-based department store chain, suggested it. Kosta informed Tom about the substantial profits that might be realized by importing retail products from the Far East, notably reasonably priced trend watches. Swiss-based Swatch watches were the fad of the day at the time of Kosta Kartsotis' proposal, enjoying international appeal as stylish chic timepieces. Tom Kartsotis was interested enough by his brother's remarks to take out his funds and sell his part of the ticket brokerage firm, giving him $200,000 to start his new venture.

Tom Kartsotis traveled to Hong Kong with no firm intentions for his future business, other than to look into the possibility of founding an import/export company. During his trips throughout Hong Kong, Kartsotis looked at numerous import/export options, including dealing in stuffed animals and toys, but ultimately chose his brother's proposal. Kartsotis recruited a Hong Kong manufacturer to build 1,500 timepieces, which he transported back to the United States and marketed to department shops and boutiques in Dallas. His new firm, Overseas Products International, was still in its infancy at the time of these sales.

The 24-year-old Kartsotis hired a friend, Lynne Stafford, as Overseas Products' designer shortly after starting his new business, and together they established the "retro" design style that defined the company's existence and fuelled its expansion during the 1980s and 1990s. With Kartsotis at the lead, the firm exploded in the 1980s, luring customers with designs that harken back to a time that only their parents or grandparents had experienced. Kartsotis and Stafford produced timepieces that replicated the designs of the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s for middle- and upper-income consumers in their teens, twenties, and thirties. Kartsotis and Stafford (who subsequently married) looked through old editions of Look, Life, and Time magazines for inspiration, noting the fashion styles depicted in advertising and coming up with a design idea that was accepted by a new generation of customers.

Kartsotis needed to expand and strengthen his distribution network before customers could rush to their local retailers to buy Fossil watches. The watch designs struck a nostalgic chord in the hearts of the brand's early clients, but the company itself was little more than a fledgling retailer struggling to recruit legions of customers. Kartsotis' firm, however, was on the verge of rapid expansion, thanks to funding from Asian manufacturers and many years of marketing his items to an ever-increasing number of merchants. After establishing a good reputation among Texas merchants, Fossil, Inc., as the firm was now known, was bringing in $2 million in sales per year by 1987. Kosta Kartsotis joined Fossil in 1988, right in the middle of the company's most explosive growth era. Kosta Kartsotis' duty was to assist the corporation in selling its watches to department shops, which was his area of expertise, and to guarantee that Fossil watches were available in as many locations as possible.

By the end of the decade, there was plenty of evidence that Fossil's efforts to expand its distribution network had paid off. The firm earned $20 million in revenues in 1989, having grown tenfold in two years, and made one significant modification in its marketing strategy that fueled much more growth in the years ahead. In 1989, Fossil began packaging its watches in ornately designed tin containers and wooden boxes, further enhancing the brand's nostalgic appeal. A marketing campaign showing Fossil watches on the wrists of models engaging in risky activities in exotic surroundings was created to further pique consumer interest, drawing analogies to the famous mystique surrounding the "Indiana Jones" movie.

The firm soon grew from an entrepreneurial whim to a fast-rising corporation drawing substantial attention from the retail business press, and the jump from $2 million to $20 million in revenues between 1987 and 1989 created irrepressible excitement for the 1990s. Kartsotis sought to do this throughout the 1990s by conquering foreign markets, expanding locally, and diversifying into new product lines, as any corporation capable of registering substantial financial growth would.

During the first few months of the 1990s, practically all of Fossil's revenue came from the sale of watches in the United States.

When the decade began, international markets accounted for around 3% of the company's sales, but that would soon change.

Its reliance on the sale of watches as its sole source of revenue would also be a problem.

In 1990, the firm launched a range of leather items as well as a new watch brand.

The leather goods line grew over time to include purses, wallets, and belts, among other products, while the new watch brand, Relic, was advertised as a less expensive alternative to Fossil watches and sold to retailers like Sears and J.C. Penny. In tandem with the launch of these two new lines, Fossil began to focus more on expanding its worldwide business, first in Europe, where it opened a subsidiary in Traunstein, Germany. Despite the fact that the corporation had begun to expand abroad, it would be several years before it had sufficient financial means to do so aggressively.

As Fossil entered the 1990s, it continued to develop at a rapid pace, with revenues rising from $20 million in 1989 to $32.5 million in 1990. The next year, sales climbed even more to $57.1 million, as the power of the Fossil brand name expanded and propelled sales upward. One of the company's main goals in the 1990s was to raise awareness of the Fossil name, and Kartsotis accomplished this by associating the Fossil name with one of the most well-known stores in the country. In 1991, Macy's created a 300-square-foot Fossil Watch "Super Shop" in one of the best settings for a tiny but rapidly-growing firm to get notice. The Fossil store, which opened on the main floor of Macy's flagship store in New York City, was a marketing bonanza for the Texas-based brand, and its debut served as a forerunner to the retail locations Fossil would build on its own in the mid-1990s.

In 1992, sales increased to $73.8 million, with Fossil and Relic watches accounting for more than 90% of the total. By this point, Fossil's entry into the design and marketing of leather products had accounted for less than 5% of overall revenues, but this complementing side industry would soon become more vital to the company's bottom line. Despite phenomenal financial success in the first two years of the decade, Fossil had yet to seriously expand worldwide or pursue the strategic objectives that would define the company's advancement in the mid-1990s. During this time, Fossil's management emphasized international development, brand awareness, and strategic diversification, but before these three goals could be completely realized, the business took a move that gave the financial resources needed to carry out its long-term strategy.

Fossil completed its first public offering of shares in June 1993, selling 20 percent of the firm to investors, with Tom Kartsotis holding 40.5 percent of the company and his brother Kosta holding 18.8 percent. Fossil received $19 million in revenues from the conversion to public ownership, half of which was used to pay down debt and the rest was placed aside as operating capital.

Fossil's nine-year-old firm had a busy year after its first public offering of shares. By this time, Fossil was manufacturing more than four million watches per year, with the actual production taking place in other countries and carried out by outsourced manufacturers. Fossil watches were sold at over 2,000 locations, including department stores such as Carter Hawley Hales Stores, Dayton Hudson Corporation, Dillard Department Stores, Federated Department Stores, May Department Stores Company, and R.H. Macy, as well as specialty stores, with prices ranging from $45 to $110. Relic watches, on the other hand, were designed to appeal to a different demographic. Ames Department Stores, J. C. Penney Co., Service Merchandise Co., and Target Stores all have retail locations. Fossil provides an ever-changing range of Fossil items to these merchants and the expanding number of Fossil customers, seeking to stay on top of the trend wave. Fossil's 500-watch product line was refreshed five times a year, providing customers a wide range of options and updating the company's inventive but nostalgic design trends that powered its financial success.

During its first year as a publicly listed corporation, the firm aimed to expand its strong domestic business internationally. Fossil had many European companies in 1993, led by Fossil Europe GmbH, the company's main European division, which was based in Germany. Fossil France SARL and Fossil Italia SRL, which operated as Fossil's marketing and distribution corporations in these nations, were also subsidiaries on the continent. Fossil B.V. was founded in 1993 as a holding company for these three European companies, with Texas-based Fossil, Inc. controlling 70 percent of its newly formed European holding company.

Fossil's European operations were restructured as part of the company's plan to boost overseas sales, expand brand recognition, and diversify product lines. In 1994, the firm made significant progress in each of these areas as a result of three significant advances. Fossil said early this year that it will be adding a range of men's leather items to its product mix, with leather key fobs, money clips, and wallets expected to arrive in time for Father's Day. Then, in April, Fossil signed an arrangement with competitor Seiko Corporation, which one business executive described as "another significant foreign market." Fossil provided Seiko the rights to distribute Fossil goods in Japan through Fostim, a fully owned subsidiary managed by Seiko, as part of the five-year contract, allowing the Texas-based brand to enter the Japanese market. Following this arrangement with Seiko, Fossil declared its goal to create 150 concept stores within department stores by 1996, as well as future intentions to extend its store count to 500.

Sales had increased considerably from $105.1 million in 1993 to $161.1 million by the end of 1994. Despite the company's sustained sales growth, the expected rate of expansion was falling short of expectations. As the firm proceeded through its tenth anniversary year and into 1995, domestic sales of Fossil watches began to dwindle, leading Kartsotis and the rest of the Fossil management team to focus their efforts on expanding the company's global market presence and diversifying. Fossil released a line of sunglasses in the summer of 1995, reducing its reliance on watch sales to fuel expansion, and raised its investment in Fossil B.V., the holding company for the Fossil operations in Europe, in October. Fossil raised its shares in Fossil B.V. by paying $1.7 million to 88 percent, giving the corporation more influence over a market that was supposed to compensate for volatile watch sales in the US.

Fossil fashion watches were offered in department shops and other upmarket retail venues in more than 50 countries in 1995, offering the corporation a large geographic platform on which to build its business. By the end of 1995, international sales, particularly those sourced from European markets, accounted for the majority of the company's sales growth as sales growth in the United States began to slow. By early 1996, the firm had grown to 20 retail stores from four the year before, and it was looking to international markets for financial expansion in the late 1990s.In April 1996, the corporation paid $700,000 in cash for an 81 percent stake in Seiko-owned Fostim, gaining more control over Fossil product distribution in Japan. Under Seiko's supervision, Fostim has placed Fossil items at more than 180 retail sites in Japan. Fossil Japan was rebranded Fossil after the acquisition, and it was expected to be one of the company's key focal areas as it outlined its objectives for the late 1990s. Although the company's first decade of existence had been marked by rapid revenue growth, the coming decade was predicted to deliver more mundane progress. Despite this, Fossil management felt upbeat about the company's future and the power of the Fossil brand name and its distinct image to attract customers from all over the world.

When Fossil bought Zodiac Watches from Genender International in 2001 for $4.7 million, it was a Swiss brand that had been around since 1882. The purchase of the Zodiac Watch brand and a complete retooling of that line to reflect a retro contemporary 1970s aesthetic in a higher priced watch was driven by Fossil's ambition to build a Swiss presence. With the acquisition of Michele Timepiece in 2004, the cycle was completed by delivering a high-end Swiss watch with a creative flare.

In a case filed in the Northern District of Texas in September 2007, Fossil was accused of infringing on a patent owned by Financial Innovations Systems, LLC. The matter was eventually resolved for an unknown sum and dismissed.

In December 2007, the Watch Station International chain was bought from Luxottica/Sunglass Hut.

Fossil has design labs near Rolex in Biel, Switzerland, as well as manufacturing and distribution operations in China and Dallas, Germany, and Asia.

Skagen Designs and several of its partners were purchased by Fossil, Inc. in 2012 for roughly $225 million in cash and 150,000 Fossil shares. Fossil would pay a total of $236.8 million in compensation.

Fossil released its upmarket and more costly "Fossil Swiss" brand of timepieces produced in Switzerland in early 2013.

In November 2015, Fossil acquired Misfit for $260 million, with plans to incorporate Misfit's technology into traditional-looking watches.

In 2021, the corporation had to reduce its workforce from 10,200 to 7,500 people.