A partnership led by a dot-com company investor is the new majority owner of local aloha shirt maker and retailer Reyn Spooner.
Aloha Brands LLC, a firm led by Charlie Baxter, bought the controlling stake in a deal announced Monday. A purchase price was not disclosed.
Baxter is a part-time Kauai resident who once was CEO of eTranslate, a San Francisco firm that helps companies operate globally, and is now chairman of Wineshipping.com. He also was an early investor in Japan’s largest e-commerce company, Rakuten Inc., where he is a board director. At Reyn Spooner, Baxter is now chairman.
The deal is expected to result in store expansions and merchandising partnerships in and beyond Hawaii for Iwilei-based Reyn Spooner. No changes in management or employees are being made.
Baxter’s acquisition follows the one by Los Angeles-based investment firm Wedbush Capital Partners that in 2008 acquired majority ownership of Reyn Spooner, which was then a kamaaina family business headquartered in Waimea on Hawaii island.
Wedbush intended to take Reyn Spooner, described at that time as a strong and profitable company with an iconic brand, to another level by adding stores and merchandising deals outside Hawaii.
Reyn Spooner under Wedbush’s control aimed to expand from 10 Hawaii stores in 2008 to more locations locally and on the mainland and perhaps internationally. Today, however, the company has seven Hawaii stores and sells its apparel in specialty retail and department stores outside the state as well as online.
Kirk Hubbard III, a veteran Reyn Spooner executive who remains the company’s chief executive and president, said the recession hurt the expansion effort but that Wedbush was able to help develop new apparel lines and renovate stores.
"Wedbush was good with the company," he said.
Hubbard said Baxter and other principals of Aloha Brands are longtime fans of Reyn Spooner who will bring new energy, creativity, business experience and financial strength.
"We are excited to work with our new partners, who understand the history and heritage of Reyn Spooner," he said.
Baxter, 49, said he has been visiting Hawaii since the 1960s and has worn Reyn Spooner aloha shirts all over the world.
"I’ve been a tester of the product for more than 40 years," he said, adding that he got married in a Reyn Spooner shirt on Hawaii island.
Baxter said the company under Aloha Brands will focus on opening more stores in Hawaii while also investing in operations for the long term.
"Reyn Spooner is an iconic brand, and we are committed to its history, culture and its successful growth in Hawaii and beyond," he said.
The roots of Reyn Spooner go back to 1949 when Reyn McCullough established a traditional menswear store called Reyn’s on Catalina Island in California. McCullough relocated the store to Ala Moana Center in 1959 after moving to Hawaii.
The haberdasher partnered with a woman known for sewing custom swim trunks in Waikiki, Ruth Spooner, to make aloha shirts under the name Reyn Spooner in 1961.
In the late 1960s, after McCullough acquired full ownership of the business from Spooner, he took an Ivy League-style cotton aloha shirt he had designed and created something new by sewing the shirt with the fabric facing inside out. The move created an aged, sun-bleached look of shirts worn by surfers, and the reverse-print aloha shirt was born.
McCullough died in 1984, though the company remained a family business run by the founder’s son, Tim McCullough.
In 2008, Tim McCullough was the primary selling shareholder in the deal with Wedbush. He became chief design officer after serving as CEO for 30 years, and retired about five years ago.
