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Cariloha announced the opening of three new stores this week in Orlando’s International Airport, St. Thomas’ Crown Bay and St. George, Utah’s Outlets at Zion. The new corporately owned stores range in size between 500 square feet and 1,000 square feet and are the only retail stores in their respective cities and regions selling exclusively clothing, bedding, accessories and bath goods made from eco-friendly bamboo.
Except for Orlando, each Cariloha store is located next door to its sister brand, Del Sol, which is a separate retailer selling clothing and accessories that change colors with sunlight.
The Cariloha retail brand has been rapidly expanding its international and domestic presence for the past six years with 13 corporately owned and 30 independently owned stores in 13 countries. Cariloha stores are found in Mexico, Grand Cayman, Jamaica, Barbados, Aruba, Curacao, Honduras, St. Maarten, Bahamas, Antigua, Bonaire and various cities throughout the continental U.S., Alaska and Hawaii.
Additional Cariloha store openings are planned in 2014 in Washington D.C., Denver, Kauai, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and many more. The independently owned stores will be operated by licensed, contracted partners of Cariloha, LLC.
“Opening these three new stores came with three new opportunities to expand the Cariloha Bamboo brand,” said Scott Brady, AVP of Communications. “We had no previous retail operations in Central Florida, or in St. Thomas’ Crown Bay cruise ship dock, or in the state of Utah, where Cariloha’s corporate headquarters and worldwide distribution center are located. We hope to permeate Cariloha’s feel-good brand in these unique, growing markets.”
The Outlets at Zion store will be Cariloha’s first outlet store and will offer both discounted and test-market products, while the Orlando store will be Cariloha’s first airport store.
All Cariloha store guests receive a free bamboo lei (necklace) just for visiting the store, which helps proliferate the bamboo, eco-friendly attitude even further. Cariloha staffers encourage visitors to touch and feel the ultra-soft difference of their bamboo shirts, sheets, towels, and hand bags for themselves.
Bamboo apparel contains several properties that are unique compared to other fabrics. It’s twice as soft to the touch as cotton, 3 degrees cooler than cotton, hypoallergenic and odor resistant, which is highly beneficial on a hot day.