Designer Philipp Plein fires back after lawyers for Dolce & Gabbana accuse him of trying to steal sales associates from its Milan store.
Designer, Philipp Plein
Fashion brands know how to protect themselves. This is the view of designer Philipp Plein, who took to Instagram earlier this week to address legal accusations from Dolce & Gabbana, who claimed his company was poaching employees from one of its Milan stores.
“These people, these brands, they don’t want competition. They know how to protect themselves. Everybody does that. When you have a monopoly, you don’t want anybody next to you eating from your cake. This is what is happening in this industry,” he says, speaking at the opening of his new store on London’s New Bond Street on Thursday.
“In this competitive moment, everybody is trying to survive,” he adds. “I’m not an enemy and I’m not a bad person, and I’m not trying to catch the others or to steal the people.”
Plein, whose namesake fashion brand has built a significant retail presence of 120 stores globally over the past five years, shared an Instagram photo on Monday of a letter he had received from Dolce & Gabbana’s lawyers “accusing me and my people that we would steal their employees.” His post had generated 6,790 likes and over 500 comments at the time of publication.
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