Between Outlets and Malls, Levi’s Grows in a Market That Stopped Growing

Levi’s opened a store at the Mítikah shopping center in Mexico City in mid-August. With it, the brand reached 91 locations in the country, which may seem like another step in its expansion. But its physical network tells a less linear story: while it concentrates company-operated stores in some markets, in others it maintains a presence through third parties, and nearly one in three locations operates as an outlet.

The composition of its stores shows that the change has occurred not only in the size of the network, but also in how it expands. Since 2020, when Levi’s had about 80 stores in the country, the number of locations has grown by roughly 14%; during that same period, 16 of the 29 outlets it currently operates opened. Thus, while its overall network grew relatively moderately, more than half of its current outlets opened in less than six years, expanding a format aimed at capturing more price-sensitive consumers and moving inventory and merchandise from previous seasons.

Geography completes the pattern. Levi’s operates its own stores in 26 of Mexico’s 32 states and maintains a presence in the remaining six through third parties such as Liverpool and Sears. Its direct network is concentrated primarily in Central Mexico and the Bajío, which account for 68% of the identified locations, but outlets opened over the past five years have begun to alter that distribution. Before 2020, the 13 outlets already in operation were concentrated primarily in those regions; since then, however, new locations have expanded into Baja California, Nuevo León, Quintana Roo, Sinaloa, Sonora and Tamaulipas. The format has therefore not only gained weight within the network, but has also increased Levi’s density in Central Mexico and extended its reach beyond the markets where it has historically been concentrated.

The case shows that expanding coverage and decentralizing a network are not necessarily the same process. A brand can extend its geographic reach without shifting the core of its commercial real estate footprint and can even do so—through third parties—without directly assuming the cost and real estate commitment of its own store, while reserving direct occupancy for locations where controlling the point of sale justifies the investment. Commercial coverage and real estate footprint therefore do not necessarily grow at the same pace, and a retailer’s expansion depends not only on how many markets it can reach, but also on which ones require it to occupy space directly.

For Levi’s, that selectivity keeps shopping centers as the mainstay of its network. Nearly two-thirds of its stores in Mexico are located in malls, compared with roughly one-third in outlets and a marginal share in flagships. The recent growth of outlets, therefore, does not replace the dominant format, as shopping centers continue to account for most of the brand’s direct presence.

Diversification takes on a different meaning in an environment of weaker consumption growth. After increasing every year from 2020 through 2024, real spending on semidurable goods in Mexico fell 2.5% in 2025 and declined another 2.6% year over year during the first quarter of 2026, according to INEGI data. The trend does not explain Levi’s outlet expansion, which began years earlier. Still, it does make a network capable of addressing different levels of price sensitivity without extending a discount strategy across all of its stores more relevant.

The change matters because it alters where growth can come from. With semidurable consumption declining, increasing sales depends more heavily on capturing existing spending, whether from other competitors or channels. That raises the importance of real estate selection, as each new store must compete for a share of a market that, at least for now, has stopped expanding. In that environment, outlets allow Levi’s to compete for demand with a different commercial proposition than its regular stores, while Mítikah—store No. 91—does not take Levi’s into a new market, but adds another point from which to compete for spending in one where it was already present.

To learn more about the performance of Mexico’s retail market and its tenants, visit SiiLA Market Analytics or contact us at contacto@siila.com.mx.