Jens Grede

These malls needed fresh concepts for their customers.

Les understood this opportunity and created and bought companies and developed these concepts that he could replicate time over time over time with favorable economics.

in all of the malls that was built in America.

He's a genius of retail.

I'm just saying none of those retailers would be around if it hadn't been for the expansion of the American mall.

If you're into luxury, Ralph Lauren, Donna Karan, Giorgio Armani, Versace, Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana, I can go on.

All happened within the same five years.

Some of them might have been started slightly earlier, but it was a distinct period of time where they expanded.

And that's directly linked to Sachs and Neiman Marcus and Barneys.

Because these designers were able to sell their goods and finance their goods for something called factoring, where you get the money before you get your invoice paid, creating a positive cash flow, which is why someone like Giorgio Armani still owns 100% of his business.

That could not be replicated today.

It was a unique situation and a unique financing model.

that led them to be able to retain the full ownership and scale their companies to a critical size.

2008, in the aftermath of the financial crisis, people wanted designer values.

but they wanted to pay less for them.

Enter Michael Kors, Tory Burch, Dragon Bone, the expansion of Coach, and all of these companies that today makes $5 billion, $10 billion, $15 billion businesses.

There was a change in consumer taste.

That's kind of well-documented.

What no one talks about is, do you remember all the diffusion lines?

D&G, Harmonic Exchange, all of this diffusion lines.