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Business|How Vuori Became One of the Hottest Names in Fashion
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/business/vuori-athleisure-tech-pants.html
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The 10-year-old company has ridden the popularity of its tech pants to the top rungs of the athleisure market. But “it’s still early days,” Vuori’s founder says.
Jan. 18, 2025, 5:00 a.m. ET
When Joe Kudla talks about the Vuori customer — the loyal, die-hard consumer of the company he founded a decade ago — Jimmy Spencer is exactly the kind of person he has in mind.
“Oh, I’m Mr. Vuori,” said Mr. Spencer, 41, a Californian who works in sports media and bought his first Vuori T-shirt about six or seven years ago. He estimates he now has 45 items in his closet, including fleeces, jackets, shorts, a stack of those tees in various colors and Vuori’s Meta Pant — five-pocket tapered trousers that are made from a polyester fabric typically used in performance apparel.
“I work in L.A., and no one is wearing suits postpandemic,” Mr. Spencer said. “What Vuori has been able to do for me is create a very casual but nice, high-quality look for me to slip into every day.”
Look around you and you may find that tech pants are everywhere. Tech, in this case, refers not to technology but to “technical” textiles, such as nylon and polyester, that give the pants stretch, breathability and moisture-wicking properties. They have replaced suit trousers, khakis and even jeans as the preferred style for many men, and Vuori has erected dozens of stores — from Atlanta to Austin, from Philadelphia to Palo Alto — to cater to them. Young professionals wear these pants to their offices, where dress codes have loosened considerably post-Covid, and they have become a costume of a new male archetype: affluent tech executives who prefer athleisure and Apple Watches to power suits and Rolexes.
To put a number on just how popular this style is, look to November, when Vuori closed an investment round of funding for $825 million, bringing the company’s valuation to $5.5 billion.
“It’s still early days for Vuori,” Mr. Kudla, 46, said on a video call from Carlsbad, Calif., just north of San Diego, where the company is based. He cut a striking figure in a high-collared jacket from the brand’s recent foray into outerwear, and has the weathered yet disarming good looks of a former model, which he is.
