Mike Jeffries and Abercrombie & Fitch: Style and Substance

A creative, visionary leader who is obsessed with youth and fashion and who protects the brand he has turned around, Mike Jeffries has a leadership style that is controlling, quirky, and superstitious.

Jeffries, the current chairman and CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch Co. (A&F), was born into retail. His father, the owner of a small chain of party-supply stores in Los Angeles, let him select all the merchandise for the toy departments when Jeffries was just 12. He studied economics at Claremont McKenna College and got an MBA at Columbia University.

After working with many top retailers, in 1980 Jeffries founded Alcott & Andrews, a fashion store for career women. The brand did well at first, ...

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