Calvin Klein

Its one of the most recognized fashion brands in the world andwith more than $5 billion in annual salesalso one of the most profitable.

Bronx-born Klein started his company in 1968 a coat shop with childhood friend Barry Schwartz. Legend has it that a buyer from the now-defunct high-end department store Bonwit Teller accidentally stumbled into his workroom in 1969 after getting off on the wrong floor; within a week Klein had his first $50000 order. By the early seventies he was designing award-winning womenswear and lingerie collections and hed made the cover of Vogue. A decade later the brand became known as much for its pioneering marketing and advertising campaigns as its minimalist fashions: Brooke and her jeans Kate and her Obsession Mark and his tightie-whities. With a mix of successes (huge growth marketing genius critical acclaim) and failures (rocky start with menswear near-bankruptcy in the early nineties a feud with a distributor) the business would relentlessly expand and establish lucrative licensing deals for jeans underwear fragrance home products and eyewear. Klein sold the company to Phillips-Van Heusen in 2003 and his Brazilian protg Francisco Costa was appointed creative director of womens. Today Costa is the labels most visible face and his collections have been well received by both critics and the industry. Italo Zucchelli helms menswear and Kevin Carrigan oversees the sportswear and retail line of Calvin Klein and ck Klein as well as the licensing arms.