Marcus Lemonis on Building a Fashion Chain, Retail Pitfalls and Brioni ShirtsThe serial investor/celebrity jump-started his new Marcus women's fashion chain by converting other retail sites he owned into Marcus stores.

[Collection]The fashion industry has a merchant prince waiting in the wings — Marcus Lemonis, the star of CNBC’s reality show “The Profit.” Under the umbrella of the two and a half year old Marcus Lemonis Fashion Group, he has invested in brands selling jeans, ready-to-wear, cashmere, scarves, T-shirts, footwear and watches. His investments include Inkkas Shoes, Printed Village, Flex Watches and Susana Monaco, and he’s partnered with Lisa Shaller-Goldberg, president and creative director of Minnie Rose, to launch a brand called Threads of Privilege. Last fall, Lemonis discretely launched Marcus, a specialty chain selling women’s contemporary fashion, footwear, accessories, books, home decor, chocolates, gifts and the artwork on the walls. It’s moving fast, with 21 stores up and running already, most converted from other small retail operations in which Lemonis invested. “I saw an interesting void in the market,” Lemonis said, citing the demise of Scoop and Barneys Co-op shops and how Intermix hasn’t had the same panache since Gap Inc. bought it in 2013. “Scoop went out of business, when they took Stephanie out of the equation and put in a mass buying process,” Lemonis said, referring to Stephanie Greenfield, Scoop’s founder, who sold the business to private equity firm Yucaipa Cos.

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