• The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), Tuesday, December 19, 2006 12:15 PM

American Apparel, the hip Los Angeles apparel and retail company known for sexually provocative marketing, announced today that it will be acquired by a so-called specified purpose acquisition company called Endeavor Acquisition Corp.

Hooking up with Endeavor is a way for the fast-growing retail chain to expand rapidly--especially overseas--without going through the lengthy process of an initial public offering.

The Los Angeles-based company is best known for hawking its snug-fitting T-shirts and cotton underwear with sultry advertising. It makes nearly all of its products in a multistory factory in Los Angeles rather than overseas.

American Apparel executives, including charismatic and sometimes controversial founder Dov Charney, will remain on board. Charney, who sports 1970s-style facial hair and has a keen sense of what's cool, started American Apparel as a wholesale T-shirt business after failing at a similar apparel venture in South Carolina. Soon, he was creating his own designs.

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