Yasmine Soufan purchased her first piece from Cue about seven years ago, when she was in the final year of her university degree and on the cusp of entering the workforce.
The 26-year-old account manager isn’t the usual demographic for Cue or Veronika Maine – which collapsed into administration this week – but has found herself returning again and again to the workwear labels that make up more than half her wardrobe.
“I gravitated towards them because of their styles. They were timeless pieces,” said Soufan. “I still have sweaters from when I first bought them, and I still wear them all the time. They last.”
Soufan isn’t sure that her mother – a sharply dressed woman who prefers simple, black silhouettes, and Soufan’s first style inspiration – has heard the news that the brands’ owner, distressed company investor Hillco, had surrendered the clothing chains.
“My mum’s obsessed with those brands. She’ll be sad,” Soufan said. “The pieces she selects are definitely more mature, whereas the pieces that I select are definitely more Cue than they are Veronika Maine.”
The news that Cue Clothing Co’s future hangs on the emergence of a saviour has evoked emotional reactions from women across Australia who began and moved through their careers in outfits by the fashion labels that perfected mod dresses, power suits and sharp tailoring.
Founded nearly six decades ago by the Levis family, Cue became of the first brands to pioneer the store-within-a-store concession model in department stores by joining forces with Myer in 1970. At its peak, it had more than 200 standalone stores, outlets and concession stores. Veronika Maine was launched in 1998, three decades after Cue, targeting women more advanced in their career with a greater emphasis on architectural silhouettes and premium fabrics, entering David Jones in 2005.
“I want it to still be around when I’m 50.”
Yasmine Soufan, long-time customer
Predominantly designed and manufactured in Sydney, Cue and Veronika Maine grew a loyal following for high-quality constructions suited to Australian body shapes and justified their price points in the hundreds of dollars.
“It was right on the enormous expansion of women’s participation in professional and white-collar employment,” said University of Technology Sydney associate professor and fashion researcher Toby Slade. “It was this sweet spot where urban young women who needed clothes could shop there and signal professionalism, fashionability, ambition.”
Cue’s designs reflected the growing presence and authority of Australian women in the workplace as fashion moved from power-dressing in the 1980s to the monochrome minimalist looks of the 1990s.
“All these social changes that were happening through the ’70s and ’80s were giving [women] outfits that weren’t just appropriate, but also had a little bit of glamour to them. I think we could include Cue in that,” said Slade. “It’s not just giving women a uniform for work; it’s giving them a fashionable uniform for work.”
The late 20th century Australian woman’s fashion universe consisted of what was geographically available to them in shopping centres at the time: Sportscraft, Country Road, Carla Zampatti, Cue and Veronika Maine among the dominant brands.
But by the 2000s, which hailed the era of the internet, fashion became more casual as the growth of creative and technology sectors subverted the formality and stiffness of traditional suits.
Then international brands such as Zara and H&M moved into Australia and online shopping made global labels widely accessible. Fast fashion players gained steam, and workwear evolved to embrace knitwear, denim and sneakers.
The casualisation of workwear has been in train for decades, said Slade, well before the pandemic hit, though that acted as a major catalyst for more relaxed separates that worked fluidly at home, in meetings and after-work drinks.
Personal stylist Josephine Eve, who takes her corporate executives to Cue and Veronika Maine, has observed a shift in what clients are asking for since the pandemic. “Dress codes have changed a lot,” she said.
People still want a tailored suit or a well-fitted dress, but with the freedom to dress it up or down by switching from sneakers to heels. “They want more flexibility with their workwear. They want to have that ease – not be overly dressy, but not underdressed, either.”
Even athleisure can be seen as acceptable to wear in the workplace now, said Slade.
“What happened was almost a collapse of categorical dressing. Work clothes, weekend clothes, going out clothes – it’s all a smart casual merge of those categories.”
“This makes it really challenging for mid-market and premium women’s wear retailers whose historical strength was polished office dressing rather than a sort of smart casual blend.”
Despite the voracious success of fast fashion giants Shein and Temu, Soufan says she sees a shift among Gen Z, who are consciously turning away from the hyper-growth of ultra-fast fashion giants in favour of investment pieces that will last.
But Soufan says she didn’t see much of a social media presence from Cue or Veronika Maine and wonders whether they may have missed reaching a new generation of women. “Influencers are huge. They didn’t really play into that,” she said.
“You either have a parent that shops there or know of older women who really vouch for the brand, or you stumble across it and go, f–k, the quality’s amazing,” said Soufan.
Last year, Cue founder Rod Levis sold the business to Hillco Capital, a British investor that specialises in lending to trouble companies and dealing with distressed assets. It was a harbinger of this week’s collapse. Some Australian retailers that enter administration survive, but many do not – at least in a recognisable form.
Soufan hopes Cue and Veronika Maine can avoid that fate and survive to dress the next generation of working Australian women. “I want it to still be around when I’m 50.”
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Jessica Yun is a business reporter covering retail and food for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via X or email.From our partners
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