China Blacklists Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein
Tiya Antony
Fashion News Editor
PVH corporation has previously been known as the Philips-Van Heusen Corporation, is an apparel company that owns various brands like Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein. Their headquarters are in New York City, but they have stores and manufacturing companies in China. Due to the recent economic tensions between America and China, leading to the placements of tariffs, PVH is now on the ‘unreliable entities list’ in China.
This means that the Chinese government is allowed to prohibit import and export, deny employees entry to China, and fine retailers. There is a lot of uncertainty because there are no specifics to what this exactly means for the PVH corporation and whether they can continue their stores or will face fines. There is concern that PVH may have to shut down Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein stores in China. PVH has 6% of their sales and 16% of their total profit coming from China in the last year. However, the bigger blow for PVH is the hit they could take in manufacturing because China supplies and manufactures 18% of their total production. Tommy Hilfiger sales staff in China are also concerned about their jobs as they have no more information about the situation. PVH in a statement said that they would work with the authorities in China to solve the situation.
As the two biggest economies of the world are rising in tensions, the business world is worried about the effects if American companies left China. Even before the tariffs, companies have been moving their manufacturing outside of China or planned to move out within the next few years.
The unreliable entity list was created by China in 2020 in order to blacklist American military related companies like Skydio, which is a drone supplier. PVH entering this list is an odd and sudden move because a consumer brand is being targeted for the first time instead of defense companies.
America also has an entity list that targets corporations that are considered national security threats, accused of human rights abuse, and more issues. All USA retailers prohibit sourcing from the Xinjiang province, which is Far western province in China. This started during Joe Bidens administration due to labor and human right concerns of minority populations being forced to work in mass internment camps. Analysts suspect that the Chinese government may have made the move against PVH as a retaliation effort against America for not buying cotton resources from Xinjiang. Although PVH will be impacted, China’s economy will not be affected because other American companies in China like Nike hold more economic advantages and provide more jobs.
As more information comes out, the business fashion world is interested to know the impacts that China’s move will have on the PVH corporation and the entire fashion industry.
Contact Tiya at antonyti@shu.edu