The retailer told Business Insider that its decision was due to the brand’s declining sales.
“Each year we cut about 10 percent [of brands carried] and refresh our assortment with about the same amount,” a Nordstrom representative explained. “In this case, based on the brand’s performance, we’ve decided not to buy it for this season.”
The New York Times reported that “major companies appear to be re-evaluating their relationships” with the brand itself. The fallout from the presidency has been one that has hurt sales, as Neiman Marcus recently said it would remove the Ivanka Trump jewelry line from its website presence.
One impetus to shrinking ties between corporate visibility and Trump’s brand has been the protests that, so far, have been a hallmark of the presidency. Some sites like GrabYourWallet.org have featured campaigns looking to spotlight ties between firms, Trump and boycotts of the former.
In an interview with the NYT, Wendy Liebmann, chief executive of consultancy WSL Strategic Retail, said, “Retailers around the country are going to say, ‘Do we need the aggravation or not?’ It’s hard to imagine that, if a brand is really, really doing well, a retailer like a Nordstrom or Neiman Marcus would cut off their nose to spite their face.”
In response on Twitter in November, Nordstrom said it was not taking a political stance by selling Trump’s products: “We hope that offering a vendor’s products isn’t misunderstood as us taking a political position; we’re not. We recognize our customers can make choices about what they purchase based on personal views, and we’ll continue to give them options.”
It looks as though the company may have finally succumbed to the boycott pressure.
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