Sweaty Betty - the female-focused London athleisurewear brand that says it is “on a mission to empower all women" - has one of the biggest gender pay gaps of any company of its size in the UK, the Standard can reveal.
The figures show Sweaty Betty has the 90th-largest median gender pay gap out of more than 10,000 firms in the Government database, or the 11th-largest gap of any company with more than 1,000 employees.
The median woman at the company makes 46.2p for every pound made by men there, or 53.8% less. That puts Sweaty Betty in the bottom 0.4% of companies of its size for pay equality.
Looking at the mean instead of median, there were still only 21 companies with a larger gender pay gap than Sweaty Betty — and 13 of them were football clubs. Sweaty Betty’s mean pay gap was 56.4%.
Official figures show that lower-paid roles at the company are almost entirely held by women. Among the top quarter of jobs by pay at Sweaty Betty, most are also held by women, but this group includes a much higher share of men than its lower-paid roles.
Sweaty Betty’s large gender pay gap does not appear to be an inevitable consequence of the sector it’s in. Rival athleisurewear brand Lululemon, its most direct competitor, had a median gender pay gap of just 6%. Lululemon’s mean gap was closer though, at 38%.
None of the other companies of similar size with larger gender pay gaps operated in the fashion or retail sectors.
In figures published just two years ago, the gender pay gap at the brand was lower than the UK average, at just 10p per pound.
However, it rocketed in last year’s figures and continued to climb in the ones published this year. The rocketing pay gap came in the first year that the data covered Sweaty Betty’s takeover by US fashion firm Wolverine Worldwide, who bought the brand from its founders, Tamara and Simon Hill-Norton, for £300 million.
According to the Sweaty Betty website, the brand - which was founded in Notting Hill in 1998 - is “on a mission to empower all women through fitness and beyond”.
“This means finding more sustainable ways of working, making sure inclusivity is at the heart of everything we do, and investing in our community through the Sweaty Betty Foundation,” the website continues.
It is known for championing body positivity. Last month it launched a new campaign and brand goals that are “designed to lift women up”.
Sweaty Betty and Wolverine Worldwide did not respond to a request for comment.
