Founded in 1989 by Missy Park and named after the landmark legislation that paved the way for gender equity in athletics, Emeryville, California-based retailer Title Nine initially carved out a niche serving women who played on courts and fields. But as the landscape of women’s activity shifted toward the outdoors, Title Nine’s customers are just as likely to be found scaling a mountain or navigating a trail.
“We realize there’s a spectrum of women adventuring in the outdoors,” said President Laurie Etheridge, who has previously held roles at VF Corp., Levi Strauss and Roxy, in an interview with SESO. “There are the people, including our founder, who are on very hardcore mountain biking adventures. And then there are people whose adventure is trying to wrangle three kids on a bike with a dog on a leash.”
Title Nine, which is predominantly selling through ecommerce but also has 14 brick-and-mortar stores in the West and Midwest, aims to serve women across the spectrum — something male-focused brands don’t always do. The $100 million company is debt-free, and 90% of its factory and agent partners are women-run or women-owned. Title Nine’s executive team is entirely comprised of women, and more than 90% of its workforce are women. As of 2024, more than 78% of Title Nine’s inventory revenue was from brands that are women-owned. That number increased in 2025.
To reflect how Title Nine has caught up with its own community, the company unveiled a comprehensive rebrand. “Find Your Wild” visually represents the retailer’s strategic pivot from its team-sports origins toward a broader, more adventurous outdoor identity.
Harmonizing the Brand with the Customer
The impetus for the rebrand was recognition that the company’s external identity no longer represented its internal reality. While the product assortment had long since evolved to include hiking and camping gear and trail running apparel, the branding remained tethered to the past.
The strategy is an effort to align the brand with the multifaceted lives of their customers, Etheridge said.
“Title Nine had recognized that (disparity) many years ago and started to shift the product assortment and many of the ways we mobilize with our customer community around the outdoors, but our branding expression really lagged,” she said.
The visual overhaul features a kinetic, abstract logo and a bold orange color palette designed to convey energy and optimism. The mark itself is open to interpretation — some see mountains and a sun, others see a woman in motion, Etheridge said. But the intent is clearly to step away from static imagery.
Image courtesy of Title Nine.
Founder and CEO Missy Park said the brand’s evolution honors the company’s roots while acknowledging the current landscape.
“When I started Title Nine almost four decades ago, I set out to build a company that was about women first, last, and always,” Park said in a statement. “I look at our community now and am in complete admiration of so many women who show up as leaders at work and in the outdoors, all while balancing life and the mess of it all. We celebrate these badass women finding their own adventures in life, and our new branding captures that culture and energy perfectly.”
Business Health: Rebounding from a Tough Year
The rebrand comes as Title Nine emerges from a challenging period for the retail sector. Like many in the industry, the company faced headwinds in 2025, driven by tariff uncertainties and a pullback in consumer spending.
Etheridge was candid about the difficulties the company faced mid-year, noting that, anecdotally, it seemed consumers reduced spending out of anxiety in the months following “Liberation Day” in April.
“We felt that as we hit the midpoint of the year,” Etheridge said. “(We) rebounded in November and December, and that would be a function of our building out our gifting strategy and really expanding the range of accessories for the outdoors.”
The outlook for 2026 appears even brighter. The company has a strong start to the year, driven not by a single “silver bullet,” but by the cumulative effect of operational adjustments and inventory strategy.
“It is like a switch flipped on January 1, and we are off to the races,” Etheridge said. “Business is very, very good,” Etheridge said.
Product Strategy: Pockets, Bras and the Shoulder Season
Roughly half of Title Nine’s product is made in-house, while the other half is curated from other brands. This allows the retailer to fill gaps in the market where they feel women are underserved, Etheridge said.
Title Nine is currently considering potential wholesale distribution for its own branded product — both in physical stores and online marketplaces.
The “Boob Lab” and Technical Intimates
Bras remain a cornerstone of the business. The company claims to have the best active sports bra assortment globally, a bold assertion backed by a new in-store concept called the “Boob Lab.” This initiative connects customers with fit experts to solve the perennial problem of ill-fitting sports bras.
“We introduced it at the end of ‘24 as an experiment, and we saw conversion and sales around bras lift by double digits immediately,” Etheridge said.
As part of Title Nine’s efforts to branch out beyond its owned channels, which includes hosting women-focused outdoor adventure events, the retailer is planning to bring the Boob Lab out of the store and into different settings.
Swim and Trail
Beyond intimates, the company is seeing growth in categories that emphasize function over leisure. Title Nine’s swimwear business is booming, driven by suits designed to stay put during activity rather than just lounging (although lounging is welcome, too, Etheridge said). Similarly, the trail category has evolved to meet changing fashion silhouettes, moving toward looser, barrel-shaped pants equipped with functional pockets.
Capitalizing on the Shoulder Season
One specific area of growth has been the “shoulder season”— those transitional months between primary seasons that are often overlooked by major retailers.
“These shoulder months have proven to be a real opportunity when you can nail it with product,” Etheridge said. “So transitional things you buy in August that can take you into October and November, and the same for something you buy in January that can bridge you through until summer.”
Investing in the Ecosystem: Pitchfest and Partners
Title Nine’s influence extends beyond product sales through its annual Pitchfest competition. For nine years, the retailer has invited female entrepreneurs to pitch their businesses, resulting in nearly $75 million invested in women-owned brands through purchase orders and support.
This initiative serves as a pipeline for new, innovative products that differentiate Title Nine’s assortment. Etheridge highlighted several success stories:
- Wild Rye – A mountain bike apparel brand that won Pitchfest in 2019 and has since grown into a multi-million-dollar business and which recently raised more than $900,000 through WeFunder.
- Surf Gems – A jewelry company that creates pieces from discarded surfboard resin, founded by a woman in Half Moon Bay.
- Seniq – A women-founded outdoor apparel brand bringing a fresh, female-centric aesthetic to the market.
“We scout the world for unique outdoor apparel and gear brands,” she said. “We have a special soft spot for women-owned brands, but we’re also open, and our job is to curate the best in the category.”
Wild Rye, Stream2Sea and Alpine Fit were the first recipients of Title Nine’s TrailBlazeHer program, which launched last June. The program, which is designed to improve gender equity in the outdoor industry, subsidizes the cost of hiring sales representation for emerging brands while Caraway & Co. will train its own female team members to exclusively support companies accepted into TrailBlazeHer. Title Nine plans to continue to grow the program.
The Role of Brick-and-Mortar
While e-commerce remains the dominant revenue driver, Title Nine operates 14 profitable brick-and-mortar locations. The company views these stores more as marketing hubs and community centers than as traditional points of sale.
The data supports this omnichannel approach: in trade areas where a physical store exists, e-commerce performance is stronger. Even in markets where stores have closed, the brand sees a lingering “halo effect” on online sales.
“I’ve shifted my thinking to really challenge us to think about that truly as marketing,” Etheridge said regarding the retail footprint. “How do we, through events and our Boob Lab, offer value that isn’t just buying things? Definitely we’re in the business to sell apparel and gear to women with a focus on the outdoors, and if we can also provide other value to her in the way of speakers and events and connecting her with other like-minded women, then then we want to do that as a way to build a community.”
