Levi's CEO says the brand is growing its gender-neutral line due to increasing 'consumer appetite'

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When asked about the Bud Light controversy surrounding Dylan Mulvaney, the CEO of Levi Strauss & Co said there is "definitely consumer appetite" for a gender-neutral clothing line.  

Under Chip Bergh's leadership, Levi's has been growing its collection of gender-fluid garments. He said the move is backed by data collected by the 170-year-old company that shows more men and women are opting for products geared toward the opposite gender. 

"How do you market products in a world where people are more aware of their gender identities?" Axios moderator Hope King asked Berg in the context of "Bud Light's recent marketing stunt [that] shows where the backlash can come from."

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"We know that some women buy some men's products and some men buy women's products, we know that that goes on, we've got the research and the data to show it," he said. "That's great." 

Under Chip Bergh's leadership, Levi's has been growing its collection of gender-fluid garments. (Photographer: Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

"We are building out slowly, it started with a small collection of gender-neutral or gender-fluid line, and there's definitely consumer appetite for that," he added. "And we're there for that."

Transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney was announced as a Bud Light partner to promote the March Madness basketball tournament in April, which prompted ridicule and backlash from the media and the public in recent weeks. 

The trans activist showed off cans of Bud Light sent by Anheuser-Busch that featured Mulvaney's face, celebrating a milestone in her viral "365 Days of Girlhood" series where the influencer detailed daily experiences in her first year identifying as a transgender woman on TikTok.  

As a result, Anheuser-Busch has faced a months-long backlash with sales of the beer plummeting in recent weeks. 

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Fashion labels often market "genderless," "gender neutral" or "gender inclusive" clothing, which are championed by proponents as a groundbreaking movement that challenges the traditional gender stereotypes, but critics of the trendy category argue the industry is marketing off a social contagion, and could be doing irreparable harm, specifically to minors.

In this photo illustration, the back patch is displayed on a pair of Levi 513 jeans on April 06, 2023 in San Anselmo, California. San Francisco-based Levi Strauss & Co. reported better-than-expected first quarter earnings with net income of $114.7 million.  ((Photo Illustration by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images))

Levi's first released a gender-fluid line called Line 8 in February 2017, but Jennifer Sey, author of "Levi’s Unbuttoned" and a former Levi’s executive who was at the brand when it did its own gender-neutral campaign, previously told Fox News Digital that she has "started to see things differently," and noted that the greatest profit for the company came from traditional gender-focused products.  

Sey stood by the fact that in the past, gender-neutral campaigns touted a truism about the brand: that men wear women's Levi's and women wear men's Levi's. 

"It wasn't a reinvention of the product line," Sey said. "I still think it's woke washing. If we want to call it that. And yes, I did it and I would probably do things a little differently now."

"Levi's has always been a brand for everyone," she told Fox News Digital in a statement. "Just leave it at that. Why wade into controversial politics around gender ideology? Now? When the Bud Light backlash caused a more than 20% decline in sales in April for their flagship brand?"

She said companies are blinded by ideology and pressured by a small minority of employees, consumers and activists that have lost sight of the fact that the purpose of business is to deliver profits. 

"This approach Levi's is taking alienates a significant portion of the population who takes this to be the company furthering a controversial ideology that says biological sex isn't real," she added. "Not a good move, with the stock price already down more than 20% this year, and 50% from two years ago. Just stick with Levi's is for everyone."

She also previously told Fox News Digital that the trend could potentially be very confusing to young people, who should be encouraged to accept who they are in their bodies.

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"The fact is, there are biological males and there are biological females," Sey said. "When the message is being promoted by popular brands, by your teacher in school, that those two things do not exist … I think it's really confusing to kids."

"It can become very retrograde," she added. "I was a little girl that was a tomboy and I was an athlete. It didn't mean that I wasn't a girl. I thought that was what the feminist movement was all about."

Levi's clothing is displayed at a Kohl's store on April 06, 2023 in San Rafael, California. San Francisco-based Levi Strauss & Co. reported better-than-expected first quarter earnings with net income of $114.7 million.  ( (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images))

Sey chalked up the movement to a push by corporations and their leaders who are attempting to launder their own reputations as "do-gooders and altruists" instead of about making money.

"I think it is primarily virtue signaling," Sey said. "I think it is reputation laundering, in a sense. It's a way to signal that you are on the right side of progressive causes without actually having to do very much."

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"Positioning the brand around these woke causes is not about selling more, it's about the shield of progressivism to hide and obscure the fact that business is as it always has been," she added. 

Fox News Digital reached out to Levi Strauss for comment, but did not hear back.