Abercrombie & Fitch is making headlines again. This time because, of all things, it madea $10-million donation to a Ohio hospital, and now the facility'snew emergency room and trauma center will be named after theretailer.A coalition made up of the Campaign for aCommercial-Free Childhood, pediatricians and Parents for EthicalMarketing is asking Nationwide Children's Hospital (namedafter a Nationwide Insurance donation) in Columbus to not useAbercrombie's name. The group is worried because of Abercrombie'scontroversial advertisements depicting scantily-clothed youngpeople, which have had no lack of attention.An odd aside concerning this situation is thatAbercrombie, which is based outside of Columbus in New Albany isnot the only local retailer to make a donation to the hospital. NewAlbany-based Tween Brands' Limited Too and Justice chains will alsobe represented in a new lobby as a result of a donation thatcompany made.We know, controversy is nothing new for Abercrombie,and it doesn't seem to impact sales. Net sales during its fourthquarter rose 8%, to just over $1.2 billion, and net income was up9%, to $216.8 million.But will it hurt the company in the future?Or is there no such thing as bad publicity?

Continue Reading for Free

Register and gain access to:

  • Breaking commercial real estate news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
  • Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
  • Critical coverage of the property casualty insurance and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, PropertyCasualty360 and ThinkAdvisor
NOT FOR REPRINT

© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.