Bogner Looks for Investor Partner and CEO Plans to Exit

With roots tracing back to 1932, the family-owned Bogner is looking for a partner to invest in its international expansion.

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The Munich-based company, which offers upscale sportswear and luxe snow sports attire, will be saying goodbye to its chief executive officer Gerrit Schneider at the end of this year.

Willy Bogner Jr., whose father Willy Sr. started the namesake company in 1932, is its primary owner with daughter Florinda. They serve on the company’s board, but are not active in its day-to-day operations. Bogner has not disclosed what percentage of the business that it plans to sell.

For the fiscal year 2022-2023, Bogner’s sales were 175.6 million euros – a 5 percent uptick compared to the previous fiscal year – and earnings before interest and taxes were 13.5  million euros. The company is expected to release its 2023-2024 fiscal year results this month.

In 1932, Willy Bogner Sr. established the company with roots in sports, outfitting West Germany ski teams from the start. He competed in the nordic combined event at the 1936 Winter Games in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany. His wife, Maria, was credited with creating the modern skiwear look, overseeing design and serving as the company’s lead model. She designed the first version of Bogner’s anorak just after World War II. While her husband was in the war, she ran the company. When he became a prisoner of war, she set out on a bicycle to find him and eventually arranged for his release in Hammelburg, Germany. Maria died in 2002 at the age of 88.

Following Willy Sr.’s death in 1977, Willy Jr. and his wife Sonia, a model-turned-designer, expanded into other categories, introduced the Sônia Bogner label and the snowboard-inspired Fire + Ice brand, and opened freestanding stores. The husband-and-wife team built up and modernized the family business in the ’80s, ’90s and 2000s. In 2017, Sonia Bogner died after a long illness. Willy Jr. retired from the daily business in 2019.

In 2017, the brand’s sales were said to be in the $300 million range. In recent years, annual volume has been under $200 million. The company winnowed down its global team to 670 employees from 800 staffers in 2019. The company currently has 64 full-priced stores and 13 outlet stores. In the past year, Bogner has opened stores in New York and Los Angeles, and three in France in Annecy, Megève and Courchevel. Despite the recent closure of Fred Segal’s Sunset Boulevard store, where Bogner has an adjacent space, Bogner plans to maintain that location.

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Schneider is leaving Bogner at her own request and plans to join another company, which has not yet been revealed, according to Billy Daley, vice president of marketing and communications at Bogner of America. Schneider was said to have decided on her departure at the end of the year, prior to the Bogner family’s plans being made public.

Schneider had held the lead title since November 2022, after having served as co-CEO for more than two years prior to that. After joining in 2019, her first post was as chief financial officer.

Her successor has not yet been named and that search is being led by Bogner’s advisory board.

Bogner’s chief impact officer Daniel Hiendlmeier, who was appointed to the company’s management board in June, will help scout the new partners with Schneider, Bogner’s chief financial officer Frank Wiesner and general counsel Juliane Drerup-Hero. Hiendlmeier joined Bogner in May 2023 and furthered such initiatives as sustainability and a joint venture in China, as well as shaping the corporate culture. With extensive experience in the sporting goods industry, Hiendlmeier was most recently head of the business unit for apparel at the Mammut Sports Group. He also held management positions at W.L. Gore & Associates and Adidas, as well as had an 18-month run in marketing at Reebok.

Schneider, Hiendlmeier, Wiesner, Drerup-Hero, chief commercial officer Kristoffe Risse and chief marketing officer Jasmin-Isabelle Kohne will lead the company. Risse and Kohne are relative newcomers, having joined the company respectively in September 2023, and in January of this year.

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