Walmart Sells Eloquii to FullBeauty, Marking Second Digital Divestment this Month

Walmart will sell plus-size fashion brand Eloquii to FullBeauty Brands, marking its second divestment of an ecommerce-focused brand in one week. FullBeauty plans to make Eloquii the anchor tenant of a digital mall, where it will be joined by SwimSuitsForAll and June+Vie, to create a platform with a universal cart across multiple banners that lets shoppers select products from any product line and pay with a single checkout.

Eloquii, a digitally native brand with products that start at size 14, will fit into FullBeauty’s portfolio of brands, which feature sizing from 12W to 44W, bras in bands from 30 to 58 and cups from A to O and footwear in medium, wide and wide-wide. The acquisition will enhance the retailer’s presence in the $81 billion women’s plus-size market, which is growing three times faster than the broader women’s apparel market, according to FullBeauty data.

“Eloquii is a great success story with very loyal customers that will now become part of the FullBeauty family of brands,” said Jim Fogarty, CEO at FullBeauty in a statement. “This strategic acquisition complements our brands perfectly and allows us to leverage our scale and platform to support Eloquii and our shared mission, and thereby accelerate our growth with this important demographic. Our approach was critical to our recent successful acquisition and integration of Catherines and will be here as well. While we hope to bring scale and platform expertise to bear, we will also humbly be learning from Julie [Carnevale, Co-Founder and Brand Leader at Eloquii] and the talented Eloquii team, who are the soul of the Eloquii brand DNA, and who fortunately are joining us on this next phase of the Eloquii journey.”

The Eloquii-led digital mall will be FullBeauty’s second take on the concept and will be aimed at a young, diverse demographic. The retailer currently operates a digital mall with the brand websites of companies including WomanWithin, Roaman’s and Catherines that caters to its more traditional customers.

On April 14, Walmart entered an agreement to sell Bonobos to Express and its owner WHP Global for a combined purchase price of $75 million. It remains to be seen if Walmart is limiting its exposure to ecommerce-focused brands or if the recent sales are preparation for a new digital strategy.

Terms of the Eloquii deal were not released. The acquisition is subject to certain customary closing conditions.