When G-III Apparel Group sued PVH Corp. last month — charging that it was improperly denied the right to renew its suits license for Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein — it started to pull back the curtain on a dispute that for years has been roiling just below the surface in fashion.
Now a countersuit filed by PVH divisions Calvin Klein Inc. and Tommy Hilfiger Licensing in New York State Court has brought much more of the strife out to light with claims that G-III “refused to align” with PVH’s new strategic plan and “has seemingly gone out of its way to undermine the parties’ day-to-day business relationship, with its executives hurling profanity, insults and threats.”
A G-III spokesperson said of the countersuit: “These are baseless claims designed to distract from PVH’s own self-inflicted troubles and unlawful actions, and we will continue to vigorously defend our business and contractual rights.”
Just where it all leads remains to be seen. But unless the two decide to settle and try to put all the dirty laundry away, a New York State judge is going to get a chance to rule on the hard-knuckled back-and-forth that clearly still exists on Seventh Avenue.
The PVH/G-III split started not with the air of a personal beef, but that of a begrudging corporate separation. Now it’s getting nasty and the emotions are raw.
According to the countersuit: “A senior executive at G-III even went so far as to make an explicit death threat to a senior PVH executive. In early March 2025, that G-III senior executive told a PVH senior executive that ‘[y]ou’re lucky you don’t have a bullet in your head.’ This was immediately escalated to the highest levels at G-III.”
That’s a big change for G-III and PVH, which traditionally were allies that worked well together and successfully navigated a market that took down bigger rivals like Liz Claiborne Inc. and Jones Apparel Group.
Morris Goldfarb, G-III’s veteran chief executive officer, forged a relationship with PVH’s former CEO Manny Chirico over more than two decades, building a business that ultimately produced a combined $16 billion in North American wholesale sales for the two brands.
But when Stefan Larsson took the reins as CEO at PVH in 2021, he moved to change strategies leading PVH to declare it was going to take back its licenses.
It was no small move as Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein accounted for over half of G-III’s business at the time.
As PVH focused on building a more unified operating structure for the brands, G-III sought to make up the sales it was losing by signing new licenses, building up its Donna Karan and Karl Lagerfeld businesses and more.
That public peace was broken when G-III sued for breach of contract, arguing it had the right to extend the women’s suits licenses for another three years. PVH responded late Tuesday, filing a motion to dismiss the case, arguing that G-III is looking to “impose new obligations” that the licenses don’t provide.
The company — technically two of its divisions — gave PVH’s side of the story in its own breach of contract suit filed against G-III, charging that its longtime partner “refused to align its strategy” for the Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein licenses to the then-new PVH+ corporate strategy.
“For example, G-III insisted at the time that developing a strong digital business, as contemplated under the PVH+ plan, was not a viable business model in the United States market. G-III also was unwilling to work with the brand owners to evolve the product designs that it developed, many of which were not consistent with the respective aesthetics and brand images,” the suit claimed.
“In late 2022, following much conversation and deliberation and taking into account G-III’s unwillingness to work more collaboratively with the brand owners and ensure greater alignment with the brand aesthetics and target consumers for Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger, the brand owners informed G-III that they would need to start taking back the licenses,” it added.
The suit claimed G-III then launched a “systematic campaign to undermine the Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger brands” that included:
- Lobbying wholesale accounts to not purchase the PVH brands.
- Consolidating showroom spaces and reducing the Calvin Klein assortment.
- Causing the brands to be moved to “smaller, less desirable locations” within stores.
- Siphoning resources away from the licensed businesses and prioritizing its other brands.
- Using looks designed for Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger for other brands, including DKNY and Nautica, which G-III produces.
- And liquidating Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger products in “unauthorized markets.”
“G-III’s deliberate effort to favor sales of competing products under its own brands over its sales of its Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger products has negatively impacted the performance of the licensed businesses,” the suit alleged. “While the brand owners’ sales of Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger products have seen important gains as a result of the PVH+ plan, G-III’s sales of the licensed products in the United States and Canada are declining.”
The countersuit sees a “striking similarity” between some products G-III makes for Tommy Hilfiger and its other brands.
The suit contended the PVH side tried to “work collaboratively” as the licensing deals wound down and “repeatedly asked G-III to provide a plan for how it would improve the declining performance of its licensed businesses.”
“Instead of acting like a responsible business and complying with its contractual obligations, not to mention ceasing its and its executives’ abusive conduct, G-III chose to double down on casting itself as the victim by filing a baseless and meritless lawsuit, incredibly accusing the brand owners and PVH of acting unreasonably by refusing to extend further the women’s ‘better’ suits licenses…as was the brand owners’ agreed right,” the suit alleged.
It’s a breakup that might always have been headed for court.
The countersuit said G-III began “threatening to sue PVH, regardless of the merits of such a suit, and one of G-III’s senior executives went so far as to say that G-III ‘didn’t have to be right to sue.’ What G-III refuses to accept is that it is the brand owners — not G-III — who own Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger.”
This is all a long way from the close relationship G-III and PVH long enjoyed — a relationship that might have gotten even closer if G-III had had just a little more branded power earlier.
Goldfarb told WWD last year: “We were negotiating with PVH at one point to possibly combine both companies and their prior CEO, Manny Chirico, cited the fact that we don’t have a chit — the value of a brand as great as the value of the entity that we operated. Without the brand, we didn’t really have much. I went back home and said, ‘You know, maybe he’s right.’”
Now Goldfarb and G-III have taken a decidedly branded turn with DKNY, Donna Karan, Karl Lagerfeld and others.
But as the company moves into that future on its own, it’s dealing with a fallout with its soon-to-be ex.
