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Abercrombie & Fitch

 Brief History
 Founded by David T. Abercrombie in 1892
 Started as sporting and excursion goods store
Abercrombie Co.
 Ezra Fitch joined in 1900 to form
Abercrombie & Fitch Co.
 Acquired by The Limited in 1988
 Abercrombie Today
 Encompasses 5 stores:
Abercrombie & Fitch,
abercrombie kids,
Hollister Co., RUEHL
No. 925, and Gilly
Hicks
 Locations in: USA,
Canada, UK
 Plans to expand to:
Europe and Japan
 Organizational Culture
 Organizational
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culture is the shared
social knowledge
within an organization
regarding the rules,
norms, and values that
shape the attitudes and
behaviors of its
employees.
 The Three Components of
Organizational Culture
§ Observable Artifacts: the manifestations of
an organization’s culture that employees can
easily see or talk about.
§ Espoused Values: the beliefs, philosophies,
and norms that a company explicitly states.
§ Basic Underlying Assumptions: taken-for-
granted beliefs and philosophies that are so
ingrained that employees simply act on them
rather than questioning the validity of their
behavior in a given situation.
 Observable Artifacts
 (Fake) Stuffed Moose head in each store
 Reminder of humble beginnings

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 Logo
 Moose silhouette

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 Observable Artifacts
 Stores
 Electro dance music
 80 to 90 decibels QuickTimeª and a
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 “Sprits” display mannequins

 Dim lighting
 Spotlighting
 Greeters/Models
 Employees must wear Abercrombie
clothing
 New policy: ok if no logo and is
white/blue/grey
 Espoused Values
 Mission Statement
 “We are committed to providing comfortable 
and long lasting clothes that look good”

 They do this by, “the finest cashmere, pima 
cottons, and highest quality leather to create 
the ultimate in casual, body conscious 
clothing”
Basic Underlying Assumptions
 The brand was most represented
by young, in-shape, good
looking white people
 Gonzalez v. Abercrombie & Fitch
in 2004
 Now A&F has become an equal 
opportunity employer, uses more 
minorities in its advertising 
campaigns, appointed a Vice 
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are needed to see this picture. President of diversity, hired 25 
recruiters to seek minority employees, 
and discontinued the practice of 
recruiting employees at primarily 
white fraternities and sororities
Thank you
The End