French swimwear brand Vilebrequin relaunches its $260 swimming trunks after Jeff Bezos wore them and created a buzz online that was too big to ignore
- A pair of $260 Vilebrequin swimming trunks that Jeff Bezos was photographed in over the summer - and were ranked among the 10 hottest menswear items by the fashion search site Lyst - have come back in stock.
- A spokesperson for the brand told Business Insider that it decided to start reproducing the trunks, which were from the 2014 collection, after Bezos wore them and created a "frenzy" online.
- Bezos was photographed in the trunks while partying with the billionaire David Geffen aboard his megayacht off the coast of Spain in the Balearic Islands along with his girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez; former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein; and the model Karlie Kloss.
- Sign up for Business Insider's retail newsletter, The Drive-Thru, to get more stories like this in your inbox.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Jeff Bezos is officially a fashion influencer.
French swimwear brand Vilebrequin informed Business Insider on Thursday that it has relaunched a pair of its $260 swimming trunks that were produced as part of its 2014 Spring-Summer collection after Jeff Bezos was seen sporting the trunks over the summer and created a buzz online.
"The frenzy around Jeff Bezos shorts was so big that we have decided to bring back this Spring Summer 2014 print and relaunched a production in a very short period of time," a spokesperson for Vilebrequin told Business Insider in an email. The octopus print trunks are currently being sold on its EU and US websites. They are being sold for $260 in the US.
The Amazon founder and CEO made headlines over the summer after he was photographed on a glamorous European vacation with his girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez. Bezos and Sanchez were seen arm-in-arm walking the streets of France's celebrity hotspot Saint-Tropez and aboard David Geffen's $590 million superyacht with former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein and the model Karlie Kloss.
Bezos' fans couldn't help noticing that during this time, he was regularly seen sporting the pair of octopus-print swimming trunks.
After shoppers saw Bezos wear the brand, their interest in the brand grew, and data showed they began enthusiastically searching for the trunks online. According to the fashion search site Lyst, online shoppers searched for these swimming trunks more than 4,000 times in the third quarter of 2019, and the brand saw a 105% rise in page views during that time.
Because of this, they made Lyst's ranking of the hottest menswear items, joining the likes of Nike's Air Jordan 1 Mid SE sneakers and Burberry's train-ticket print-leather card case.
