MR PORTER talks to the man behind the brand about why it appeals to the modern man.

Times are tough on the American high street and many fashion brands are reportedly struggling. But Todd Snyder appears to be bucking that trend. Sales at the brand’s newly opened flagship store in New York on Madison Square Park are exceeding all projections. It has also just held a warmly received (and enviably attended) catwalk show at New York Fashion Week: Men’s. What’s more in 2017, there’s plenty to come, with a number of interesting brand collaborations in the offing. So what is Mr Todd Snyder’s secret?

His backstory is illuminating on this front. Mr Snyder launched his eponymous brand in 2011 after working his way up the ranks of at Ralph Lauren and Gap before becoming head of menswear at J.Crew.

Alongside J.Crew’s legendary CEO Mr Mickey Drexler, Mr Snyder helped to turn around dismissive public perception of J.Crew as just a preppy catalogue brand and make it relevant again – largely through smart partnerships with the right third party brands such as New Balance, Red Wing Shoes, Alden and Timex. He introduced the hugely successful Ludlow suit, which brought good, slim-fit, affordable-ish tailoring to the man on the street. And he came up with the blueprints for the then game-changing Liquor Store in TriBeCa – a multi-brand concept shop that looks like every man’s ideal apartment, and which set the bar and provided the template for pretty much every menswear boutique since.

But Mr Snyder always had designs on setting up his own label, and the success of the Liquor Store cemented those ambitions. So he took a leap of faith – and every cent he had – and did it.

On Monday night, as an addendum to NYFWM, MR PORTER hosted an evening with Mr Snyder at Ludlow House, Soho House’s latest property in Manhattan, as part of our long-running MR PORTER On Style series of interviews with top menswear designers. Scroll down for our edited highlights of the conversation:

You had a good gig at J.Crew. Was it hard to leave?

I laugh about it because I had a really, really good job. Made a lot of money. But I turned 40 that year, and I thought to myself if I’m ever going to do this, I might as well do it now. It was the best thing I ever did, but also the hardest thing. I used every penny I had to start my own collection, and it went by pretty quick, actually. So that was the biggest lesson that I learnt. You have to kind of make it through the first two or three years. And then after you get through that, and you can survive, you’re okay.

You’re the king of collaborations. Why do they work for you?

It’s almost like when you see two people collaborating in music, it comes to a new level that you couldn’t imagine. Collaborations are also a way for me to reach a broader audience. If I’m honest, not everyone knows what Todd Snyder is yet. But most everybody knows what Champion is, or what Timex is. So if I can do something with them that’s slightly different than what they offer today and shows a different course, then it benefits us both.

Your Todd Snyder + Champion line was very timely. Did you predict the “athleisure” trend or were you just lucky?

No. I did not predict that. It definitely was chance. Champion was my first target after starting my own label. I’ve collected probably over 2,000 pieces of vintage Champion. Champion was a brand that I always wanted to work with just because they were what I remembered in college as my first sweatshirt, they’d been around since 1919, before adidas, before Nike, before Puma, any of those brands. They’ve been making what they’ve been making for a long time. But I always felt like they were a bit stale, and I felt like there could be something new done. I can’t claim to have predicted athleisure or whatever you want to call it, but this just felt right.

Who would you say is the Todd Snyder customer?

We’ve kind of discovered this sweet spot in between 35 and 55 years old. And we have one purpose in mind: to help men dress better. Our goal is to help the man on the street understand what’s happening in fashion, to help dissect what is cool and what trends they need to be on, what trends they need to maybe just let pass. It’s understandable, and it’s also affordable.

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