Marissa Webb Leaves Post As Banana Republic Designer, Becomes Creative Adviser

She will continue as creative adviser for the label and Gap Inc., which owns Banana Republic, continues to have minority investment in Marissa’s own label. She said in a statement that this change “opens the door for even more possibilities for my own collection and Banana Republic”.

Webb joined Banana Republic in April 2014, in an attempt to energize and recast Banana as a more modern, lifestyle brand, and wean it off an overdependence on traditional careerwear.

Last week, Gap announced that its Old Navy President Stefan Larsson had resigned and is taking the CEO job at Ralph Lauren Corp. It underscores the latest challenge facing Art Peck, the company’s CEO who took over the helm of Gap in February to turn around the business.

Sales at Gap in September fell 1% during the five weeks ending October 3 to $1.46 billion against $1.48 billion for the same period previous year.

The designer also left her position as Banana Republic’s executive vice president of design to simply act as creative adviser.

According to FBR & Co analyst Susan Anderson, it is likely Gap will lower its earnings per share guidance when it releases its third-quarter results. Instead, its design team will work together on future collections. That was better than the 6.2 decline analysts had predicted.

Overall, sales in stores open at least a year slipped 1 per cent for September. The figure is a key metric of retailer’s health because it excludes sales from locations that have opened or closed in the past year.

The retailer now expects third-quarter gross margin to be flat with the second quarter as it plans to clear inventory before selling holiday merchandise.