SAN FRANCISCO – The 501 may be the company’s most popular jeans, but it is the constant innovation of Levi Strauss & Co that has maintained its status as a household name.
The 150th anniversary of the classic 501 jeans, named after their lot number for easier identification, also coincides with the brand’s 170th anniversary.
The company was founded in 1853 by German-American businessman Levi Strauss, and was originally a dried goods store that sold, among other things, high-quality denim.
Levi’s historian Tracey Panek says: “In 1872, he got a letter from a tailor named Jacob Davis in Reno, Nevada. He ordered some fabric and told Strauss about the innovative way he strengthened the material for the miners, adding rivets to the pockets. They were selling like hotcakes and Davis couldn’t keep up with the demand, so he invited Levi’s to take out a patent with him.”
The approved patent marked the origins of what is now known as the 501 jeans.
Originally a heavy-duty work pant worn with suspenders, it had a cinch in the back to adjust sizing for different miners. Over time, it became part of mainstream fashion.
The brand is associated with high-quality apparel, and a pair of Levi’s is a fashion staple.
For many, it was also a marker of social status, like it was for the company’s chief executive Charles Bergh, 66, better known as Chip.
In an interview at the Levi’s headquarters in San Francisco, he says: “I was getting ready to go to middle school and all I knew was that the cool kids wore Levi’s. I had to ask my mother to drive me three towns away to get them, and I wore them every single day of seventh grade. I was one of the cool kids.”
As CEO, he is largely responsible for reviving the company to what it is today, after nearly two decades of minimal growth and fighting lawsuits against other fashion lines for stealing the patented back pocket design.
The company’s net revenue was US$4.8 billion in 2011, and it went up to US$6.2 billion (S$8.5 billion) in 2022.
With a background in the military and 28 years at consumer goods giant Procter & Gamble as a “brand guy”, Mr Bergh has experience that was invaluable in the dramatic market turnaround which has helped Levi’s reach those aged 20 to 30. He calls them a “lost generation” of consumers who grew up in the era when Levi’s was not doing too well.
He achieved this through several initiatives.
