I noted with interest that ownership of bankrupt Hawaiian clothing retailer Hilo Hattie has transferred today to Royal Hawaiian Creations. While I’ve never heard of Royal Hawaiian, their half-working website indicates that they manufacture and wholesale Hawaiian wear. They are Honolulu-based, and previously owned two Waikiki stores that apparently closed last year.
News reports indicate that Royal Hawaiian, which was the store’s second largest creditor in bankruptcy, plans to convert the Hilo Hattie Nimitz Highway location to manufacturing. At the same time, however, their remains a “for lease” sign on that property.
We’re happy to see this last chance for the Kauai-founded Hawaiiana clothing legend, and this is indeed great news for the 200 Hawaii employees of Hilo Hattie. When I last wrote about them in April, it appeared that dissolution was the only likely outcome of the bankruptcy.
I’m hopeful that the new owners can overcome the plethora of problems that plagued Hilo Hattie in recent times, including:
- Prior focus on foreign vs. Hawaii-made merchandise
- Ongoing difficult credit markets
- High cost of Hawaii-based manufacturing
- Multiple failed expansion and reorganization attempts
If you want to follow the history on Hilo Hattie’s issues, here are articles I’ve written regarding their bankruptcy filing, and the underlying issues.
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I love going to Hawaii and have been there several times. I’ve stayed on three islands so far, Oahu, Kauai and Maui and plan to stay on Hawaii in the near future. Each time I go, I always visit Hilo Hattie…ever since my honeymoon when the tour-bus driver stopped off at the Hilo Hattie on Nimitz, (that was already a manufacturing facility at that time) I became facinated with Hawaianna. I purchase several hundred dollars of Aloha shirts every time I visit Hawaii…and quite a bit of that is at Hilo Hattie. I’ve been at the Hilo Hattie in Las Vegas and the one in Orlando as well! I have one rule for purchasing Aloha shirts… Regardless of where I purchase the shirt, it must be made in Hawaii. Unfortunately, the last time I visited Hilo Hattie on Maui, I discovered that none of the newer shirts were made in Hawaii anymore…Luckily, I found some old stock and purchased what I could find, but that wasn’t much. I was so dissapointed. I ended up only purchasing the two shirts I could find made in Hawaii…I didn’t buy any thing else I was so disappointed. it was very sad.