How BAPE Kept Its Cool for Decades

The wrinkles on A Bathing Ape aren’t from sitting in the tub too long. At 31, the brand is an old-timer in the world of streetwear.

You’d hardly know it given its momentum.

Last month, the Japan-based label made its Paris Fashion Week runway debut through a collaboration with Colm Dillane’s label KidSuper. Within a matter of days, ultra-popular US influencer and Twitch streamer Kai Cenat appeared in one of its hoodies on the cover of Billboard. BAPE has also been in the midst of a brick-and-mortar push in the US, debuted a global partnership with the digital music streaming platform Spotify and hired a new chief executive, Mahmoud El Salahy, all in the past year.

“We’re not reinventing the wheel. We’re just going back to what made us loved, appreciated, and respected by the culture and consumers, but just amplifying it,” said El Salahy, who previously held APAC-focused senior executive leadership roles for Tommy Hilfiger, Timberland and The North Face before becoming BAPE’s CEO in January 2024.

The company looks to be pulling off a rare achievement. BAPE has managed to scale upwards and evolve despite turbulence within the streetwear category it shaped. And more than a decade after its founder — Japanese streetwear pioneer Nigo, now artistic director of LVMH-owned Kenzo — left the label in 2013, BAPE continues to grow, even as other cult streetwear brands, including Supreme and Off-White, have struggled to find a way forward under new ownership.

Today, A Bathing Ape Group, which includes BAPE and its off-shoot labels such as AAPE and Baby Milo, has more than 120 stores worldwide, including nine in the US, and a presence in 31 markets globally when including wholesale.

“I believe that we will be able to close our fiscal year in a relatively very good position compared to what’s happening in the industry at large,” said El Salahy, who declined to specify BAPE’s revenues but said the brand has been performing particularly well in the APAC region, citing accelerated growth in Japan and resilience in China despite softness in the market.

Although BAPE isn’t the hyped streetwear brand it was during the 2000s — with even its biggest early supporter, Pharrell, infamously declaring in a 2020 Drink Champs podcast he hasn’t worn the label since 2008 — it has held a consistent presence in streetwear by not straying too far from its original identity and playbook. Today, even though it has grown into a mainstream label found everywhere from Dubai to New Jersey’s American Dream shopping mall, the brand has maintained the distinct look and perspective that made it one of streetwear’s first cults.

“They never fully sold out, went too crazy with licensing deals, or anything like that,” said Rachel Makar, senior director of merchandising at StockX, where BAPE’s staples consistently trade above retail. “They’ve stayed very true to their price point and made themselves a heritage brand.”

Staying true to BAPE’s DNA is top of mind for El Salahy as the company plans to further scale globally and reach new customers, particularly within the US. Central to its ambitions is attracting more shoppers to its offering beyond the graphic T-shirts and hoodies that fuelled its rise through the 2000s and 2010s among hypebeast consumers, who themselves have moved on to other styles.

“This is really the journey of elevation,” said El Salahy.

How BAPE Scaled Globally While Maintaining Its DNA

Before Michael Vincent co-founded the multi-brand Asian streetwear retailer Invincible, he worked as a retail manager for several years at BAPE’s first American flagship store in New York’s SoHo neighbourhood in the early 2000s. Back then, it was the only BAPE store in the US, and the brand didn’t wholesale. When Vincent reflects on the brand, he finds that the product hasn’t changed much compared to those limited releases he sold to rappers like Jay-Z.

Instead, he believes the label has aged and evolved naturally to stay alive. The only major difference he sees today is that the trendy BAPE customers of the past have shifted away from wearing the label head-to-toe as the brand has become more “commercial” and global.

“There’s a lot of brands who peaked like BAPE and couldn’t recover,” said Vincent.

Like other popular streetwear brands, BAPE’s ownership has changed as it has grown. In 2011, Hong Kong-based retailer I.T Limited acquired a 90-percent stake during a moment when Nigo struggled to handle the label’s business, which was posting losses and going into debt. In 2021, BAPE privatized and received investment from the private equity firm CVC Capital. El Salahy described it as a great partnership that has helped accelerate BAPE’s global expansion.

Over the years, the company has managed to diversify its catalogue through several sub-brands that focus on different consumers, ranging from women to kids. It allows the company to strike a balance between “the core” products that respect BAPE’s most iconic streetwear motifs, and “the more,” as El Salahy put it, which are sub-brands such as BAPE Black that offer BAPE’s most premium offerings, akin to Purple Label by Ralph Lauren.

T-shirts and hoodies are still BAPE’s strongest categories, but el Salahy said sales in outerwear accelerated in 2024 and that the label plans to move deeper into sneakers and bottoms in the coming fiscal year. While Japan is BAPE’s home territory and still biggest market, El Salahy said the brand has a broad customer base because of its wide range of offerings, which is also what makes it attractive to both its wholesale accounts and longtime customers.

Ross O’Hanlon, a senior buyer at the American streetwear retailer Concepts, said the brand does well for its business because it offers something for everyone. Where other heritage streetwear names such as Supreme have narrowed in on a more edgy and niche customer, O’Hanlon finds that BAPE was always focused on a broader audience, which comes across in diverse product offerings that includes everything from pet homes to kitchenware.

“You can make BAPE a part of every aspect of your life if you wanted to,” said O’Hanlon.

That’s the case for super fans of the brand, such as the Dutch collector Mike Nieuwstraten, who has collected BAPE for over 15 years. Granted, Nieuwstraten’s collection is primarily focused on vintage products released during Nigo’s tenure, but he still finds he’s been able to age with the brand by buying new products from sub-brands such as Mr. Bathing Ape to use as office wear.

Beyond ‘Ape Head’ T-shirts and ‘Shark’ Hoodies

Key to inspiring BAPE’s current and future customers, according to El Salahy, is to continuously express the brand’s DNA through its key three pillars: fashion, music and art.

The brand has showcased its range beyond streetwear basics with its own fashion shows in Shanghai, Tokyo, and New York City since 2023. They give BAPE a chance to show off its iconic motifs worked into more ambitious products for elevated runway looks. KidSuper’s Paris Fashion Week show put BAPE “Sta” sneakers crafted out of boro denim on the runway, while BAPE’s Shanghai show included black tweed jackets with sterling silver ornaments that have only been released in select markets.

El Salahy described the shows as being a part of BAPE’s first chapter to reignite energy internally and to push the label’s boundaries. The recent collaboration with KidSuper was also part of that effort and marked the launch of “BAPE Collective,” a new pinnacle collaboration tier that grants select partners deeper access into BAPE’s archives.

Just as important have been the brand’s activities in cultural spaces. In music, it released a capsule collection with rapper Don Toliver and worked with the rappers Glorilla and Gunna to take over the cover art of Spotify’s “RapCaviar” playlist for its partnership with the music streaming platform. Likewise, BAPE collaborated with artists to create large-scale murals at global events such as Atlanta Art Fair, the London Mural Festival and Miami Art Basel. Since 2023, it has been revisiting its “BAPE Gallery” concept from the 2000s, which invites artists to work with its motifs to create BAPE-inspired art for gallery shows.

Collaborations with artists and musicians have always been a core part of BAPE’s cult appeal. BAPE collaborated with Pharrell and artists such as Futura years before they became go-to street culture partners for the luxury industry. The approach is still part of BAPE’s playbook, but El Salahy said the brand doesn’t just chase “double branding” partnerships to build heat or commercial opportunities. It searches for authentic tie ups that it thinks will resonate with its customers.

The US will be a priority for the brand as it looks ahead. It’s already seeing good momentum in its e-commerce business, El Salahy said, and it has bolstered its growth with the opening of three new stores in Las Vegas, Chicago, and New Jersey within the past year. El Salahy still sees room for growth in Asia as well, with Korea offering a “very promising” opportunity.

What will be vital to the brand, for not only the next five years but the next 30, is staying true to what it is.

“If you walk far away from your DNA and what made you famous and loved at the beginning, you lose, quite frankly,” said El Salahy. “‘Why was the brand created?’ You just have to go back to your why and amplify it from there.”