Tween Brands announces that it will convert approximately 560 Limited Too stores across the country to its more value-oriented Justice brand to drive growth and profitability. Both brands sell fashion basics and lifestyle items to 7-14 year old girls. Upon completion of the conversion by the end of the first quarter of 2009, the Justice chain, which has 310 stores today and has averaged double-digit comparable store sales over the last 14 quarters, will have more than 900 stores nationwide. The company will no longer operate any Limited Too stores in the United States following the conversion, but will continue to sell Limited Too branded product at select Justice stores.

Tween Brands plans to close 26 underperforming Limited Too stores by the end of fiscal 2008 and monitor an additional 90 former Limited Too locations for possible off-mall relocation under the Justice brand. In a limited number of prior conversions from Limited Too, the new Justice stores have done equal or more volume, and in a few cases, significantly more.

"This is a bold strategy to capitalize on the tremendous success of Justice and the changing trends in our economy and our customers' preferences," said Tween Brands chairman and chief executive officer Mike Rayden. "Especially in these tough economic times, our customers are seeking the more value-oriented apparel available at Justice, which is priced on average approximately 20-25% lower than Limited Too."

Noting that the Limited Too brand was established in 1987, Rayden continued: "Limited Too was the brand that introduced great fashion to tween girls, but our customers are looking for the next great thing and their parents want more value for their dollar. We believe Justice fits that bill as evidenced by strong sales comps at Justice and weaker comps at Limited Too, including this quarter's results. In fact, from fiscal year 2005 to fiscal year 2007, overall net sales at Tween Brands have increased 34%, yet our operating income has increased only 2% due in large part to the significant investments we have made to differentiate Justice and Limited Too."

Rayden concluded, "We are financially sound. We have good liquidity and the right people to execute this transition. We believe this strategy will create value and excitement for our customers and enhance returns for our shareholders."
 

JCPenney uses the PTC retail platform, FlexPLM to help streamline its product development processes by managing the company's product specifications. The department store uses the system to improve collaboration among its global design partners and help expedite overall design and manufacturing cycle times.

To keep up with consumer demand and fast fashion trends in the retail and apparel industry, JCPenney realized that it had to decrease the amount of time it takes to develop a new product line from several months down to a few weeks. To accomplish this objective, JCPenney launched its Cycle Time Reduction initiative, an enterprise-wide program focused on shortening the amount of time from conceptualization to merchandise delivery.

FlexPLM is a Web-based platform that streamlines communication, tracks milestones, pre-empts performance bottlenecks, and provides visibility throughout the product development chain.

"The ability to respond to customer needs quickly and deliver merchandise efficiently is critical to delivering on JCPenney's vision to be the preferred shopping choice for middle America," says Peter McGrath, executive vice president, production development and sourcing, JCPenney. "As an important enabler to our Cycle Time Reduction initiative, FlexPLM is a robust infrastructure that spans our global supply chain, enabling our Associates to collaborate more effectively and deliver merchandise that inspires our customers."

Throughout the last year, the IT team at JCPenney worked with PTC's solution and implementation team to define and maintain the project's scope across several functional groups in order to ensure the project was completed on time and on budget for the first three product divisions. This goal was achieved, and JCPenney is now planning to roll out the retail solution to oth