Digital Brands Group, a Los Angeles-born apparel and e-commerce firm, has packed up its West Coast headquarters and moved to Round Rock, setting its sights on the collegiate apparel game and openly eyeing industry heavyweight Fanatics. The relocation comes with plans for fast hiring and a bigger footprint for fulfillment and merchandising in Central Texas.
The company is planting its new HQ at 350 Texas Avenue in the EastGroup industrial park, according to the Round Rock Chamber. The chamber notes Digital Brands Group will start operations in about 47,611 square feet and grow to roughly 70,300 square feet within a year. At the same address, a project filing with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation details a 4,375-square-foot interior office renovation (project TABS2026008520); the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation lists the tenant fit-out and estimated cost for that scope of work.
New HQ, Big Ambitions
As reported by the Austin Business Journal, Digital Brands Group has shifted operations from Los Angeles and is now working to build out a collegiate apparel business that would go head-to-head with Fanatics. The company has already pointed investors toward growth in its college lines, with a November financial release via GlobeNewswire highlighting strong AVO collegiate revenue.
What The Competition Looks Like
Trying to chip away at Fanatics means cracking into a complex world of licensing, manufacturing, and on-campus retail, all at serious scale. Fanatics has spent years stitching together those capabilities, and its extended merchandise partnership with the University of Texas, along with similar long-term deals across the country, shows the reach any challenger is up against, according to a company release from Fanatics.
Local officials are treating the move as a clean win for the regional economy. The Round Rock Chamber says Digital Brands Group expects to employ more than 30 people at the start, with "substantial job growth" after the first year. CEO Hil Davis went even further in comments to the Austin Business Journal, saying, "I think we'll probably end up having to basically double our employee base every year" as the company scales.
Why Texas
Company executives and economic development leaders are pointing to a familiar trio of reasons for the Round Rock move: lower operating costs, an available workforce and logistics advantages that plug into broader Central Texas growth. Commercial leasing data and recent reports indicate EastGroup's Texas Avenue business park has been drawing interest from tenants, including lease activity covered by CoStar.
For now, Digital Brands Group's Round Rock headquarters adds one more player to the Austin-area consumer and tech mix and drops a fresh challenger into the already crowded college-gear market. Company officials and local leaders say the next year will show whether a rapidly scaling, tech-enabled apparel model can peel away market share from deeply entrenched competitors.
