Within the coming years, Mr. Stillwell added, Delta Attire plans to open as many as 20 new Salt Life shops throughout the nation, in Georgia, Texas, California and different states.

A Model Grows in Florida

The shop in Lengthy Department, like Salt Life’s different shops (most of that are in Florida), is designed to evoke the model’s leisurely, sunbaked aesthetic. Stacks of neatly folded shirts are organized on surfboards, and coconut-shaped candles are displayed inside a fishing cooler. Tank tops that learn “Salt Life Reel Escape” hold on a rack propped up by harpoon weapons.

David Pachanian, 65, from Marlboro, N.J., purchased a black sweatshirt that he placed on simply after leaving the shop. “It feels good for the seaside,” mentioned Mr. Pachanian, a supervisor at a catering firm.

Together with Salt Life’s progress there have been darkish intervals, too. In February, a few decade after Delta Attire paid $37 million to amass the model from its unique house owners in 2013, one among Salt Life’s former house owners, Michael Hutto, pleaded responsible to manslaughter after capturing and killing his girlfriend in October 2020.

Later that October, Delta Attire issued a press release that learn, partially: “Salt Life sends their utmost sympathies to the household and buddies of the deceased.” The assertion additionally mentioned that Mr. Hutto had not been concerned with the model since its acquisition. (Mr. Hutto, after pleading responsible, was sentenced to 12 years in jail.)

Jason Motes, 51, an expert surfer and surf coach in Jacksonville, turned an envoy for Salt Life quickly after it was based in 2003. He mentioned that the model has come a great distance since its early days, when Mr. Hutto, his childhood good friend, would go out T-shirts at events.