Former L.A. Gear chief puts on new shoe.

Robert Greenberg, who built L.A. Gear Inc. into a fashion giant reaching nearly $1 billion in sales but was forced out when the company came apart at the seams. is back with a whole new shoe.

Manhattan Beach-based Skechers USA Inc., which Greenberg founded in 1992, has filed papers with the Securities and Exchange Commission to raise as much as $115.1 million through a public stock offering.

The public offering is intended to help pay down the $67.3 million debt and help grow the 673-employee company. No date has been set for the offering.

Greenberg originally founded Skechers as an importer of Dr. Martens boots, but since then the company has grown into a trendy maker of chunky-soled tennis shoes and hiking boots. It had 1997 revenues of $183.8 million, up 59.3 percent from $115.4 million a year earlier.

Those top-line numbers, while significant, pale in comparison to Skechers' bottom-line growth. According to the SEC registration statement, net income soared from $1.9 million in 1996 to more than $11 million last year.

The largest shareholder is Greenberg, the company's chairman and chief executive, who holds a 65 percent stake. The second largest shareholder is his son, Michael Greenberg, who owns 10 percent and serves as president. No other single shareholder owns more than 5 percent of the company.

"It's a shoe that's in much demand right now, certainly by the younger customer," said Juris Pagrabs, vice president of investor relations for Venator Group, which operates the Foot Locker chain. "It is a very hot shoe among the younger customers at Foot Locker, which consist of 12- to 18-year-olds, as well as the core customer, who is 18 to 25."

Pagrabs said Skechers' ad campaign - television commercials backed by techno music, and print ads showing young, attractive men and women wearing Skechers - has played a role in the company's success. "I think they do a very good job of promoting their project in teen magazines," he said.

In its SEC filing, Skechers said it expects continued success based on encouraging demographics.

The (12-25) age group is projected to grow approximately 70.2 percent faster than the total U.S. population, from 1997 until 2005, when these young consumers will represent approximately 20.1 percent of the U.S. population," the filing said, adding that total spending by teenagers is expected to reach $135.9 billion by 2001.

The history of Skechers reads much like the early history of L.A. Gear. That company was credited with helping turn tennis shoes into fashion statements, particularly for girls and women.

The senior Greenberg, 58, a onetime hair dresser, parlayed a successful license to sell shoelaces featuring "E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial" into a company that became famous for selling shoes adorned with, among other things, beads and tassels. In 1990, it had sales of $902.2 million.

But then came a few major missteps - including the hiring of high-priced pitchmen like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone and Michael Jackson. In the end it couldn't compete with Nike Inc. and Reebok International Ltd. Its problems were exasperated when, in late 1990, a college basketball player fell during a nationally televised game after a sole on one of his L.A. Gear shoes came off.

There were other problems - including a failed side business in apparel and a worsening economy - leading sales to drop by nearly one-third in 1991, to $618.1 million.

In September 1991, an investment fund of Walt Disney Co. Vice Chairman Roy E. Disney came to the rescue at a cost of $450 million. Four months later, Greenberg, then chairman and chief executive, was ousted. Taking the reins was Stanley P. Gold, head of Disney's fund. Gold tried to turn L.A. Gear around, but ultimately gave up, selling it to another investor group.

Skechers officials, including Greenberg, were unable to comment last week because of the SEC's "quiet period" requirements.

Wall Street analysts who follow Nike and Reebok also were keeping mum, saying they had yet to see the company's SEC filing. But Maggie Gilliam, president of New York-based Gilliam & Co., which tracks the athletic-shoe industry, said she wouldn't bet against Greenberg or Skechers.

"I still think they've got a fair amount of momentum in them," Gilliam said. "The stores look good. I'm pretty impressed with what they're doing, from what I've seen. And Robert Greenberg is a very savvy guy."

While Gilliam said Greenberg is a "smart, shrewd merchant," she would still be wary of any public company that depends on fashion trends for its sales. Furthermore, she said, the stock market has not been kind to initial public offerings recently.

"You might be the sexiest thing in captivity, and it still might be difficult to do an IPO," she said.