The primary bombshell in HBO’s investigative documentary Brandy Hellville is that the unique membership for teen ladies dimension four and below isn’t named after the heartless, blond She-E-O that we all the time imagined was behind the model. That’s as a result of Brandy Melville isn’t run by a lady in any respect. It’s owned by an especially shady Italian nepo child by the title of Stephan Marsan, who has managed to maintain himself behind the scenes of his fashionable worldwide operation — till now.
Stephan launched the corporate in Italy with the assistance of his textiles knowledgeable father, Silvio, and his translator/right-hand man Jesse, in keeping with the doc. After launching dozens of profitable shops overseas, every below particular person shell companies (should have missed that recommendation in my Enterprise 101 course), Stephan ramped up the enterprise by increasing to Southern California and the remaining is a few actually darkish historical past. So the place is Stephen Marsan, Libertarian Ayn Rand stan, now that the shit has hit the fan? Right here’s what we all know to date.
What occurred at Brandy Melville?
Stephan and his group are accused of a number of vile discriminatory practices which were quietly reported for years and not too long ago placed on blast by HBO’s reporting. These embrace implementing racist insurance policies of segregation which compelled coloured staff to non-visible retailer positions, requesting and possessing hundreds of private images of staff and customers that regarded like “Brandy ladies”, and sharing anti-semitic, anti-black, and usually hateful memes and propaganda in company-wide correspondences with prime management.
Stephan’s weird politicization of Brandy Melville has additionally been closely criticized, contemplating Ayn Rand’s notorious fairytale (sure I’m utilizing that phrase deliberately) Atlas Shrugged is unfitting supply materials to make use of because the design “bible” for a teenage lady’s clothes retailer. Although the general public was saved at nighttime about Stephan and his bros master-minding the Gingham-filtered Tumblr playground, underage staff have been all too conversant in the unsafe male presence laced into Brandy’s basis, with at the least one Brandy worker reporting a sexual assault in a New York Metropolis condominium owned by the corporate.
Where is Stephan now?
Stephan did an excellent job of lurking within the shadows on the peak of Brandy’s success and is anticipated to proceed to take action now that the corporate is within the authorized sizzling seat. Sadly with a number of Brandy Melville lawsuits flying for copyright and wrongful termination points, we may even see extra of him, possibly even behind a witness stand, quickly. Although Stephan was beforehand in a position to ignore criticism from his NYC penthouse, since he stays the present CEO of Brandy Melville, it does appear the rising mountain of allegations towards him might advantage a response any day now.