“Of all the ways Jessica Simpson had imagined taking back control of her fashion empire, lying on a hospital bed with severe bronchitis, on a breathing machine, while 34 weeks pregnant with her third child, a daughter, was not one of them. “Her oxygen levels were dropping. I couldn’t breathe,” recalls Simpson of the harrowing, rather impractical moment in early 2019 when she and her mom, Tina, president of the business, decided to initiate a takeover bid. “I was 260 pounds. She was a very big baby. We were like, ‘Just take her out.’”
“Her daughter Birdie didn’t end up being delivered that day (doctors were able to stabilize her), but that moment did mark the beginning of a two-year battle for control of Simpson’s namesake brand, the rare celebrity line to break $1 billion in sales. “We’ll borrow against our homes,” says Simpson of her resolve. “Even if I have to go live in a little, tiny place in Ireland, I will.”
“When Simpson started the line in 2005, she was an improbable apparel mogul. The gospel-singing daughter of a Baptist pastor, she first surfaced on the pop-music scene in the 1990s, a new breed of sexy teen blond belters alongside Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. Although she had the vocal chops, it was the pioneering 2003 hit MTV show Newlyweds, a voyeuristic romp through the then-23-year-old’s new marriage to her boy-band husband, Nick Lachey, that vaulted her into the pop-culture firmament. Those who’d written her off as merely a ditzy entertainer became converts. Her viral malapropisms, frank charm, and sexy Texas style drew an Instagram-like following years before the social platform even existed.”
By Stephanie Clifford and Eliza Ronalds-Hannon