Lululemon and Canada Goose face falling U.S. sales, tougher rivals and younger shoppers increasingly resistant to status brands. Getty Images

Lululemon turned everyday yoga wear into a status symbol. Canada Goose did the same for winter coats. Now, two of Canada’s best-known fashion exports face a test of their staying power, particularly in the U.S. Both companies’ stock prices are down more than 80 percent from their peaks. ALO Yoga, Vuori and other athleisure rivals are challenging Lululemon, while Canada Goose is trying to stretch its appeal beyond the parka. Their competition for American shoppers is also unfolding amid an escalating U.S.–Canada trade dispute. U.S. duties imposed in August hit Canada Goose’s Canadian-made apparel, while Lululemon’s largely Asian-made products face other U.S. import tariffs.

Their U.S. sales were already under pressure before the latest tariff escalation. In the most recent quarter ended August, Lululemon’s global sales fell 4 percent, weighed down by an 8 percent decline in the U.S. On the Sept. 3 earnings call, CFO Meghan Frank reported a roughly 20 percent drop in leggings sales and acknowledged “pressure on brand heat and sentiment.”

Canada Goose is weathering a similar slowdown. In its April–June quarter, U.S. revenue dropped 19 percent year-over-year, and global comparable sales fell 3.2 percent, even as overall global sales grew 10.3 percent.

For both brands, the existential question is whether the products that captivated millennials can retain their cachet with a new generation of shoppers.

Lululemon’s familiarity problem

Founded in 1998 in a Vancouver studio that doubled as a yoga space, Lululemon defined and rode the athleisure wave throughout the 2010s. Its stock price peaked at $510 in late 2023 (five times where it trades today) before momentum began to stall in 2024.

To a degree, Lululemon has “gone off the boil” in the U.S., Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail, told Observer. While the brand remains massive and profitable, lackluster collections are discouraging repeat purchases and pushing shoppers toward younger rivals.

“Lululemon is not a brand people hate. It’s just a brand that people have become a little bored with,” Saunders said. “Lululemon is not recruiting younger shoppers at the pace it should be.”

The shift is increasingly visible online. Search volume for Lululemon fell 8 percent year-over-year, according to data shared with Observer last week by retail analytics firm Trendalytics. By contrast, searches for Vuori rose 11 percent, while Alo Yoga’s average weekly search volume surged 47 percent.

Social media data tells a similar story. Alo’s TikTok following grew 3.1 percent over the past month compared to just 1 percent for Lululemon, while Alo’s Instagram engagement jumped 96.3 percent as Lululemon’s dropped, according to Trendalytics.

“Across the board, Alo is showing the strongest growth and appears to be gaining ground on its competitors,” Cate Khan, CEO of Trendalytics, told Observer.

Adding to the pressure, Lululemon founder Chip Wilson, who left the board in 2015 but remains a major shareholder, has publicly criticized current management. In January, he declared that Lululemon had “lost its cool” after the company briefly paused North American online sales of its $108 leggings following complaints that they became sheer when bending or squatting. Rather than altering the design, Lululemon advised customers to size up and wear seamless, skin-tone underwear—an awkward fix for a brand built on technical performance.

That misstep reinforced perceptions that Lululemon was “out of touch” with Gen Z and younger millennials, said Shawn Grain Carter, an associate professor of fashion business management at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Student debt, inflation, and tariffs—coupled with “disappointing styles”—have created “a serious test of their consumer loyalty,” she told Observer.

Lululemon’s own market research shows that shoppers are clamoring for more “new and differentiated products,” CFO Frank told analysts last week. To regain traction, the company is accelerating product development and doubling down on creator content and community events. Looser silhouettes, such as the Groove Wide-Leg and updated Dance Studio pants, are performing well, but have not yet offset the broader dip in leggings.

“We remain confident these investments will help to reignite our sales trends over time as we continue to elevate our product and marketing execution,” Frank said on the earnings call. Steering that turnaround now falls to Heidi O’Neill, a longtime Nike executive who stepped in as Lululemon’s CEO this week (Sept. 8).

Canada Goose looks beyond the parka

Canada Goose, which launched in a Toronto warehouse in 1957, turned its recognizable sleeve patch into a status symbol for affluent American winters. However, that high brand recognition now comes with built-in limitations.

“The problem with Canada Goose is that it’s an expensive product that has a rather narrow focus,” Saunders said, noting that many shoppers still view it strictly as an outerwear label even as luxury competitors like Moncler and Moose Knuckles encroach on its territory.

In response, Canada Goose has been expanding into rainwear, windbreakers, knitwear and footwear. “We’re successfully evolving Canada Goose into a year‑round luxury brand,” CEO Dani Reiss said in the company’s July 30 earnings release. CFO Neil Bowden acknowledged softer U.S. store traffic, adding that the company plans to increase marketing spend ahead of its peak winter season.

Digital metrics highlight the brand’s complex positioning: Canada Goose’s online search volume dropped 14 percent year-over-year, while searches for rival Canadian outdoor brand Arc’teryx climbed 13 percent, according to Trendalytics.

The deeper challenge lies in defining what consumers want the brand to represent today. Millennials helped make Canada Goose a household name in the U.S., said Thomaï Serdari, clinical associate professor of marketing and director of the Luxury & Retail MBA at NYU’s Stern School of Business. But younger buyers are increasingly wary of overexposed brands and celebrity endorsements, leaning instead toward wellness, experiences and vintage fashion. To this cohort, conspicuous, high-priced logos can read as “cringe,” she noted.

Expanding beyond parkas requires maintaining a clear connection to the brand’s identity. “What makes the new collection distinctively ‘Canada Goose’ other than their logos?” Serdari asked, suggesting its most receptive audience remains existing millennial fans.

Canada Goose maintains that its newer categories reflect the same performance, durability and craftsmanship as its parkas. “The category may change, but the standards remain the same,” the company said in an emailed statement to Observer, noting that apparel, rainwear and windwear accounted for nearly 40 percent of revenue in its latest quarter alongside growth in its core outerwear.

Meanwhile, other Canadian imports are thriving. Vancouver-based Aritzia saw its U.S. revenue jump 54.5 percent year-over-year in its latest quarter, with American shoppers now generating roughly two-thirds of its net sales.

While brand recognition is locked in for both Lululemon and Canada Goose, their hardest task ahead is giving shoppers a fresh reason to buy their next pair of leggings or parka.