Founded in 1981, what started out as a jean-maker has since successfully evolved into a global lifestyle brand. Guess designs, sells, distributes and grants licenses for modern collections of clothes, jeans, bags, watches, shoes and other relevant consumer products. Guess products are distributed through exclusive outlets all over the world. By 30 April 2016, the company was directly operating 840 retail stores in America, Europe and Asia, while license holders and distributors were operating another 792 retail outlets. Between them, company, franchisees and distributors were operating in more than 95 countries around the world.