Albert Eickhoff

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Albert Eickhoff (born November 28, 1935 in Horn ) is a German textile dealer. He is one of the retailers in Germany who focus on designer fashion for women. He is a partner in Eickhoff Königsallee 30 GmbH & Co. KG .

Life

Eickhoff was born in 1935 as the son of owners of a general store in Horn. He attended secondary school in neighboring Lippstadt . There he began an apprenticeship as a textile merchant at Giesecke & Brand, a shop for women's clothing and fabrics. After stints in Bielefeld , at the technical school in Nagold and at the Emil Gerhard fashion house in Betzdorf , he returned to Lippstadt to work as a substitute for the buyer in the training company.

On March 15, 1961, Eickhoff and his wife Brigitte opened the Eickhoff fashion salon in Lippstadt. Their starting capital was 4,000 DM. From the outset they relied on exclusive designer fashion from Berlin couture: Uli Richter , Staebe-Seger, Detlev Albers, Rolf Horn. In the mid-1960s, they started shopping with Italian and French fashion designers such as Fouks and Star. In the following years they introduced numerous designers to the German market: with Roberto Cavalli and Giorgio Armani they were the first, with Prada and Gucci they were among the first German customers. Chloé already arranged them when Karl Lagerfeld was still working there as artistic director. In 1974 they opened their first branch in Bielefeld.

In 1976 they discovered the designs of the young designer Gianni Versace at a trade fair in Florence . They immediately bought his Genny, Callaghan and Complice collections. In the following season, too, they made exclusive purchases from Versace. On February 5, 1978, Eickhoff finally organized Versace's first widely acclaimed fashion show in the Lippstadt City Theater. It was choreographed by Nando Miglio; Top models like Pat Cleveland and Jerry Hall were among the mannequins. Numerous wealthy customers, designer colleagues and influential players in the fashion scene, including Aenne Burda , traveled to the Westphalian province on this occasion. The production received a great media response and played a significant role in the breakthrough of the Eickhoff company and the fashion designer Versace.

In 1981 Eickhoff moved the headquarters of his company to Königsallee 56 in Düsseldorf . He continued the business in Lippstadt until 1995. The branch in Bielefeld was also sold. Eickhoff later moved to the striking sales pavilion at the Kö-Center (Königsallee 30), where he originally set up a boutique for his daughter Susanne Asbrand-Eickhoff and her husband Stefan Asbrand-Eickhoff. In 2006 the daughter and son-in-law took over the management of the company, in which Eickhoff continued to work. On a sales area of ​​1050 square meters, Eickhoff achieved an annual turnover of between 20 and 25 million euros.

Albert and Brigitte Eickhoff have a son in addition to their daughter Susanne. Marcus Eickhoff is the founder of Maile , a mail order company for bespoke clothing.

Albert Eickhoff recently questioned the concept of haute couture in general, as there were hardly any customers for it and the price-performance ratio would no longer be right. He never attended the haute couture shows himself, but says he is only interested in “ironed goods”.

On November 12, 2012, his villa in the Düsseldorf suburb of Meerbusch was searched by tax investigators. The Bochum public prosecutor accused him of tax evasion.

After the opening of the Kö-Bogen , Eickhoff announced the end of its business in 2013. Compared to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , he named the expansion of the premium brands with their own stores as the reason. In 2014, the striking pavilion on the corner of Königsallee and Königsstraße was rented to the French fashion house Dior for ten years .

Services

In Germany, Eickhoff is known as the “best-known fashion retailer” and trendsetter in the luxury fashion sector, which relates to both the establishment of new brands and sales strategies. He achieves high sales quotas through the early start of the season and the early start of the respective sales, which also forces the competition to advance discounts. In the media, nicknames like "King of the avenue", "King of Kö", "Frauenflüsterer von der Kö", "Spürnase" or "Grand seigneur of the fashion world" have been attached to him.

literature

  • Ingo Salmen, Christoph Motog: Big on fashion with Albert. Stories and anecdotes from Lippstadt. Wartberg-Verlag, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2009, ISBN 978-3-8313-2061-5

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Eickhoff Königsallee 30 GmbH & Co. KG , accessed on May 24, 2012
  2. ↑ a b c Ingo Salmen, Christoph Motog: Big in fashion with Albert. Stories and anecdotes from Lippstadt. Wartberg-Verlag, Gudensberg-Gleichen 2009
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Anke Schipp, Alfons Kaiser: Der König der Allee , Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung , September 23, 2007
  4. ↑ a b c Sage - Fashion goes Sage KHK at Modehaus Eickhoff ( Memento from January 3, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF)
  5. ↑ Manager Magazin, 4/2011 (with photos) (PDF file; 3.30 MB), accessed on May 25, 2012
  6. ↑ a b Regina Gold gap: "We are living the company" , BBC News, March 7, 2004
  7. ↑ a b c d Katja Wilke: Susanne Asbrand Eickhoff - Modequeen von der Kö ( Memento from September 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) , Ftd.de , October 22, 2007
  8. ↑ a b Creditreform - Backstage: We asked Susanne Asbrand-Eickhoff. (No longer available online.) Formerly in the original ; accessed on December 10, 2019 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.creditreform.de
  9. ↑ Spiegel.de: Suspected tax evasion: raid on fashion millionaire Eickhoff , November 13, 2012
  10. ↑ a b Peter Paul Polte: “Our autumn is black.” (No longer available online.) Formerly in the original ; accessed on December 10, 2019 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.textilwirtschaft.de
  11. ^ Ingo Salmen: Discoverer of Gianni Versace , The Patriot , March 15, 2011
  12. ↑ Klaus Ahrens: Perfect Fit , Manager Magazin , June 5, 2003
  13. ^ No customers FAZ, June 15, 2004
  14. ↑ Versace's discoverer . Time May 4th 2011
  15. ↑ "Raid on fashion millionaire Eickhoff" Spiegel, November 12, 2012
  16. ↑ faz.net: Düsseldorfer Modehaus Eickhoff - “We stop at the peak” , November 11, 2013
  17. ↑ Katja Aschke: Everything must go out , Die Zeit , February 11, 1994
  18. ↑ Stefanie Schütte: The tailor is king again , Stern.de, December 30, 2003
  19. ↑ World Online: Buy me! , January 31, 2004
personal data
SURNAME Eickhoff, Albert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German fashion retailer
DATE OF BIRTH November 28, 1935
PLACE OF BIRTH horn