Coach was founded in 1941, in a loft in Manhattan, New York. When it originated,
Coach was called Manhattan Leather Bags. Manhattan Leather Bags began as a family-owned business, with six leatherworkers who made small leather goods, such as wallets and handbags. In 1946, Miles Cahn and his wife Lillian joined the company. Miles and Lillian Cahn were owners of a leather handbag manufacturing business, and knew so much about leatherworks and business. By 1950, Cahn had taken over the business and was running it mainly himself. The workers continued to manufacture small leather goods, like wallets, for small profits into the 1960s. In the 1960s, Cahn did further research on leather and discovered a very complex method for processing leather to make it strong, soft, and durable. And at the suggestion of his wife, a number of womens' handbags were designed to be more affordable. And the purses got the brand name Coach in the 1960s.
Coach women's handbags were made out of sturdy cowhide, which was much better quality than the thin leather pasted over cardboard material that was used to make other handbags at the time.This catapulted
Coach to its' role in high-quality, luxury, durable leather products.
Then, in the 1960s, the style of
Coach was revolutionized when Cahn hired Bonnie Cashin to work for Coach. Although Bonnie Cashin was already a well-known fashion designer when she started her work for Coach, this deal proved to be one of her most well-known business alliances. She did not start to work for the company right away, as she had other prior business engagements. However, Cashin worked with
Coach from 1962 until 1974, and she is said to have redesigned their products. She created new ideas, such as side pockets and coin purses, and gave the bags brighter colors as opposed to the usual hues of browns and tans.Cashin designed matching shoes, pens, key fobs and eyewear and added hardware to her clothes and accessories alike, particularly the silver toggle that became the
Coach hallmark, declaring that she had been inspired by a memory of quickly fastening the top on her convertible sports car. Due to the success that Cashin brought Coach, they ran their first ad in the New Yorker in 1963.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, business went very well for Coach. The products were in very high demand, and under a new vice president for special products, Coach had started a mail-order business. They had also owned specialty stores, and began to sell Coach bags outside of department stores. The sales of Coach increased, and soon the demand was greater than the supply. Eventually, it got to the point where sales would have to be restricted to only certain vendors. In 1979, Lew Frankfort, Coach's current CEO, joined the company as vice-president of business development. In 1983, the Cahns purchased a 300-acre dairy farm in upstate New York that they operated under the name 'Coach Farms.' It was supposed to be a vacation spot away from the New York Coach office, but instead they communted 2 hours every week from New York City to their upstate farm. So, in summer of 1986, the Cahns decided to sell Coach. In July 1986, Coach was sold to Sara Lee Corporation for $30 million dollars. Sara Lee took over the factory, the 6 boutiques, and its main store on Madison Avenue, New York. Shortly after, new boutiques were opened in Macy's stores in New York and San Francisco. Additional Coach stores were under construction in Denver and Seattle, and similar boutiques were to be opened in other major department stores later in the year.
Coach also opened its own stores in malls in New York, New Jersey, Texas, and California. By November, the company was operating 12 stores, along with nearly 50 boutiques within larger department stores.
Lew Frankfort took the position of president of the firm. Frankfort transformed Coach from the relatively small company that it was in 1985 into the world-wide known brand that it is today. He is also known for making Coach bags affordable luxury handbags for women, and the concept of affordable luxury was a big deal for the fashion industry. Up until the 1990s, womens handbags were either very expensive, or very inexpensive department store knock-offs. Coach was the middle ground between the two, therefore filling a gap in the market. Today, Coach operates 25 stores in the United States that carry full Coach collections, including women's footwear, men's briefcases and the new jewelry line. Six are located in New York City and two in Hawaii. Other locations are in East Hampton, NY, Philadelphia, Nashville, Atlanta, Houston, Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Scottsdale, Seattle, Washington D.C., and Westchester County, New York.
