A new Chinese licensee of North Brunswick, New Jersey-based Eclipse International is planning to launch as many as 1,000 mattress specialty stores dedicated to the company’s Ernest Hemingway brand over the next five years.
The licensee, Shenzhen Huasheng Home Furnishing Group Co. Ltd., based in Shenzhen, plans to open about 250 of the Ernest Hemingway Mattress stores within the next year. The remainder will be built over the next five years. All of the stores will be located in furniture malls, a popular shopping concept in China in which most tenants sell some type of home furnishings.
“This is an incredible opportunity for us to grow our
Ernest Hemingway brand internationally in ways we could not have imagined when we relaunched it earlier this year,” said Stuart Carlitz, chief executive officer of Eclipse International. “The demand for American luxury brands has not subsided in China, and Ernest Hemingway is about as American as it gets. His legend still resonates worldwide.”
The initial store rollout will concentrate on major cities such as Beijing, Guangzhou, Shanghai and Shenzhen. Future plans call for additional locations in second- and third-tier cities.
“Our aggressive rollout of the Hemingway mattress stores will help grow our partnership with Eclipse International,” said Ben Wu, owner of Shenzhen Huasheng Home Furnishing Group. “The stores are a key component of our growth strategy.”
Eclipse continues to increase its footprint in the Asian market. The Hemingway stores are in addition to Eclipse-branded mattress specialty stores that are being introduced by another Eclipse licensee, Shenzhen Meiting Creating Furnishing Co., also based in Shenzhen. That company is in the midst of launching more than 100 stores. About a third have opened, and the remainder are scheduled to open during the next two years.
