is originally a dutch fashion chain which sells clothing shoes bags and other accessories . we has approximately 240 shops and 3 000 employees in the netherlands belgium germany france luxembourg austria and switzerland . we is part of the european fashion conglomerate logo international which also owns the brands o neill and van gils . we is a company with a vertical organisation that designs its collections in house . advertising marketing and store concepts are also developed internally . we has a sales training programme called we university . we clothing industry retail founded 1917 founder e. h. de waal headquarters the netherlands products clothing fashion website wefashion.com we logo contents 1 stores 2 head office 3 history 4 trivia 5 external links 6 references stores edit we store in amstelveen we store in brussel in the netherlands there are currently 124 we fashion stores . customers in the netherlands belgium germany and france also have the option of purchasing products online since the end of 2009 . country number men shops number women shops number boys shops number girls shops total number shops netherlands 101 63 97 59 124 belgium 28 23 27 5 36 germany 37 21 35 3 39 luxembourg 1 1 1 0 1 france 9 2 7 0 9 switzerland 31 3 28 2 31 austria 2 2 2 0 2 we has various store formats we store where men women and children s clothes are sold we men which focuses on men s clothing and accessories we women which focuses on women s clothing and accessories a kids department girls and boys from 2 to 12 years may be added to the above operations . head office edit head office we fashion in utrecht the we european head office is located in utrecht in the industrial estate lage weide . the we distribution centre can be found behind head office . this centre distributes all goods for branches in the netherlands and the rest of europe . history edit on 1 february 1917 engelbertus hendricus de waal established a wholesale business selling men s clothing in amsterdam under the name e. h. de waal . an important element of the collection was sold under the brand name sir edwin using the slogan sir edwin underwear is wonder wear . citation needed the company on the keizersgracht grew to become the largest wholesale business of men s fashion in the netherlands at the time . in 1961 de waal s son karel better known as kees took over leadership of the company . a year later he took over a small retailer with four shops and founded the captain shop . in 1963 the chain was renamed to hij first short for hij herenmode he gentlemen s fashion and later for hij mannenmode he men s fashion . the shops also sold fashion for boys . after the sale of the wholesale business the company expanded and set out to conquer the netherlands . by 1977 the country had 75 hij mannenmode shops . when son ronald de waal joined the company in 1977 expansion abroad soon followed . in switzerland hij mannenmode took over ten menswear businesses rapidly adding another 30 shops under the name hey over the years that followed . starting in 1983 hij mannenmode opened 25 shops in belgium . in 1984 kees de waal stepped down as managing director . son ronald continued the expansion begun by his father taking over women s fashion company witteveen in 1986 . the witteveen formula with shops in the netherlands and belgium was changed to zij she shortly afterwards . in 1989 following a fire at witteveen s head office in amsterdam the head offices of hij and zij were merged into one new head office and distribution centre in lage weide in utrecht . in 1992 the company made the move to germany with the we store s predecessor hij and zij under one roof . expansion to france followed in 1994 where the first shops were established in the paris area . in march 1999 all shops were simultaneously renamed to we the new international trading name from that moment on . we has now become a trusted and recognisable brand throughout western europe . citation needed in 2010 the first we shops opened in vienna austria . in the same year the company entered into a partnership with a chinese partner to establish new shops in china . eventually there were 20 we chinese stores with plans to expand up to 200 . however in 2014 we pulled out of china . 1 the we collection has been available to buy on line since 2009 via www.wefashion.com as well as through a number of other e commerce providers . we is a brand with a vertical organisational structure which designs its entire collection in house . advertising marketing shop concepts and the like are also mainly taken care of in house . we university the we sales training facility has an excellent reputation within the retail industry . citation needed trivia edit the largest we stores in each country zwolle netherlands woluwe brussels belgium braunschweig germany lille france vienna austria and geneva switzerland . external links edit official website of we fashion official we fashion youtube account references edit http www.retaildetail.eu en eur europe eur fashion item 17047 we fashion pulls out of china retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title we clothing & oldid 734451848 categories clothing brands of the netherlandsdutch brandsdutch fashionmultinational companies headquartered in the netherlandsretail companies of the netherlandshidden categories use dmy dates from december 2011pages using infobox company with unsupported parametersall articles with unsourced statementsarticles with unsourced statements from april 2014 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export 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