12 retailers that bombed in 2015

J. Crew has been on the down and out since 2014.

In its most recent quarter, comparable sales were down 12%. "This [change] does not happen overnight," CEO Mickey Drexler iterated on a recent earnings call.

"As its latest set of results attest, J Crew is a mess," Neil Saunders, CEO of consulting firm Conlumino, wrote in a research note this December.

Gap's woes have been apparent, and CEO Art Peck has not been shy about detailing the company's struggles.

Its sister brand, Old Navy, has been outpacing it.

Peck explained on a earnings call this summer that shoppers should expect to see changes come spring 2016.

The brand has started taking steps to improve, by making major hires at the executive level and getting designs in stores faster. This fall, the selections looked more promising, but third quarter earnings showed yet another dip in comparable sales by 4%.

In the third quarter, the brand showed it was hurting — same store sales fell 3.9%, and the brand is anticipating a dip in the fourth quarter, as well.

On the call, CFO Karen Hoguet outlined four reasons the brand is showing wear and tear: people aren't buying fall apparel because the unseasonably warm weather, tourist spending is down, growth at the namesake stores is slowing, and the demand for its largest brand.

To help spike spending, Hoguet said the brand would increase sales. But sales — while appealing to consumers — can hurt retailers. "That will be good for consumers, but it will obviously put pressure on our own margins," CEO Terry Lundgren said on an earnings call.

Worse, Macy's has delved into serious discounting with its Backstage off-shoot, and it could hurt the department store.

Banana Republic crashed and burned in the third quarter — same store sales fell by 12%. Prior to that announcement, Gap Inc. CEO Art Peck had already illustrated that Banana was faltering.

Peck expressed his disappointment with the brand on a recent earnings call.

"I am very disappointed by the deceleration that we have seen, particularly with Banana in the back half," he said on the company's third-quarter earnings call in November. "That's been a real disappointment to me, and a bit of a surprise."

A look around the store showed that the brand had seriously faltered — no wonder customers were straying.

Kate Hudson's Fabletics was under fire this fall when customers started calling the company a scam.

BuzzFeed reported that customers had to call in to cancel their membership subscriptions, and that it was very tough to get out of the billing cycle.

The company has amassed over one thousand complaints to the Better Business Bureau.

In late October, the company announced that it would be reviewing some of its customer service policies.

Dick's Sporting Goods is scrambling to keep up with the changing pace of athletic wear.

The company sells Nike and Under Armour, but people can buy those brands elsewhere — or, they look for store-specific brands, like Lululemon or Athleta. The company has been taking step forwards with Carrie Underwood's Calia brand and the company's specialty store, Chelsea Collective.

An unseasonably warm fall burned the brand, too.

Jos. A Bank had been scaling back on its infamous "buy-one, get-many free" deals on suits, and as a result, sales started to tank.

The company, which was acquired by Men's Wearhouse last year held its final wild sale recently.

The retailer is hoping this will help business, but people primarily shopped at Jos. A Bank for the outrageous sales.

"It’s this focus on newness that will give us the best shot at winning a larger share of closet with existing customers and expanding our reach to new and younger customers," Men's Wearhouse CEO Doug Ewert said on an earnings call in September.

Aeropostale has lost favor with teens.

Piper Jaffray surveyed teens to find out where they are — and aren't — shopping in its semiannual Taking Stock With Teens Survey.

The brand ranked at the top for brands that upper-income females no longer wear. Between 22 and 32% of teens surveyed over the past two years said they no longer shop there.

In its most recent quarter, comparable sales dipped 10%. The New York Stock Exchange gave the brand a listing warning in September as its shares had dipped below $1.

American Apparel filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy this fall,

In an attempt to lure in customers who were put off by the famously provocative ads and controversial former CEO Dov Charney's allegedly inappropriate behavior the retailer toned down its image — a move that ultimately drove away American Apparel's fan base.

"I think the biggest error was not adjusting with the times in terms of both brand image and ranges," Neil Saunders, CEO of consulting firm Conlumino, wrote in an email to Business Insider, at the time of the filing.

Quiksilver, once a beloved surfer brand, filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in September.

"After careful consideration, we have taken this difficult but necessary step to secure a bright future for Quiksilver," CEO Pierre Agnes said in a release.

The brand suffered a variety of problems, but at its core problem is its niche, which is just no longer trendy..

"There's just fewer kids out there that think the surf market is cool," analyst Mitch Kummetz told The Los Angeles Times. "The heyday of the late 90s and the early 2000s is a distant memory."

Sears has been on the brink of death. Photos of deserted Sears stores show just how grim the future is for the retailer.

The company, which also includes Kmart stores, has lost more than $6 billion since 2012.

Apparel is a weak spot for the brand.

"I wish Sears wasn’t an apparel retailer, as this category has never been its strong suit, but the company keeps on trying, to no particular end. I understand what the company hope is – apparel is bought more frequently than washing machines – and so they hope to drive more traffic to the stores, but the styling is totally off-point and off-trend," Paula Rosenblum, an analyst at RSR Research, said in an email to Business Insider in October.

Nasty Gal had some hard times in 2015, even though. Jezebel shed light on a lawsuit wherein a Nasty Gal employee was allegedly laid off for being pregnant. The story, which deals with events in 2014, struck a chord in the media.

But Nasty Gal denied the alleged events described in the lawsuit. ""The accusations made in the lawsuits article are false, defamatory and taken completely out of context. The layoffs in question were part of a larger restructuring of departments we completed over nine months ago," a Nasty Gal representative said in a statement to Pret-a-Reporter. "The lawsuits are frivolous and without merit."