For 38 years, Brian Hill ruled over Aritzia as CEO, growing the Vancouver-based company into a fashion behemoth that netted nearly $1.7 billion in revenue last year. But the company could be high-pressure and exploitative, former employees said. longreads
Brian Hill, center, at Aritzia's 2007 Toronto International Film Festival celebration. Former Aritzia employees said Hill was an exacting leader with a perfectionist streak.At Aritzia's Vancouver support office — the company's name for its corporate headquarters — Hill's presence was everywhere. For a time, the commissary even offered a kale-and-celery BH Smoothie.
Other times, Hill would issue"tests," ex-employees said. He once held up a pen and asked an employee,"What is this?" When she replied that it was a pen, he threw it, saying,"Wrong, it's a blue pen." The spokesperson said Hill"has never thrown a pen in this circumstance." Hill was as particular about the people who worked at Aritzia as he was about the color of his pens."He definitely plays a bit of a hot-or-not game," a former style advisor said."'We don't need to keep this girl; she's not cute.' 'This girl can get promoted because she looks a certain way.'" A former retail-talent-acquisition specialist recalled discussing hiring Kendalls or Kourtneys — never Kylies or Kims.
A former Canadian store manager said she once gave an employee a low rating for her style in a meeting. Her merchandise manager questioned the rating, she said, asking if the employee was"skinny or fat." When the store manager replied that the employee was skinny, her merchandise manager told her to bump the employee's style rating to an eight, she said.
Jessica Porter, 30, who said she was the only Black employee at Aritzia's Paramus, New Jersey, location in 2012, said she often spent most of her eight-hour shift steaming clothes and vacuuming, while other non-Black employees weren't asked to do the same. Aritzia's cutthroat culture could create a sense of anxiety for a number of store employees. For some, working at the company became increasingly taxing as they competed for sales and tried to please higher-ups.
Kaycelyn Pascual, who worked as a style advisor in Ontario in 2018, said she became ill after working an overnight shift. When she called out sick, her manager gave her a same-day deadline to hand in a doctor's note — in person."I said, well, that's not possible, because I'm sick. It's an hour away," she said. Pascual said she asked if she could fax or send a photo of the note, but her manager said no. Pascual said she resigned that day.
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