Romney likes The North Face. Investors Not so much

Strong sales of Timberland boots weren't enough to offset investor concerns about a slowdown at VF Corp.'s North Face brand of outerwear.

Call it the curse of the GOP? CNNMoney did a piece last week noting how Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan have been both photographed wearing North Face jackets on the campaign trail.

But even though these heroes of the red states seemed to be endorsing the comfort of The North Face's fleece, investors in North Face's parent company were seeing red after disappointing sales.

VF Corp. (VFC), which owns The North Face as well as the Timberland boots brand and Lee and Wrangler jeans, sank as much as 7% Monday morning following its earnings report. The stock was down about 4% in late morning trading.

Although VF's profits were better than expected, investors seemed spooked by the fact that revenues missed estimates by a tiny margin Vibram hiking shoes.

That had some traders on StockTwits worried about future sales for VF timberland 6 inch fur boots, as well as rivals like Ralph Lauren (RL) and PVH (PVH), the owner of the Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein lines of apparel.

retail_guru: Two bones to pick in VF Q timberland custom 6 inch boots. North Face sales slowed from +16% in Q2 to +8% in Q3. Still,$VFC expects a pick-up to 13-15% in Q4 $RL $PVH

Shares of Ralph Lauren and PVH both dipped Monday as well.

But one trader pointed out that it wasn't all doom and gloom for VF timberland 6 inch sale. The company raised its dividend and did report solid gains in its footwear unit.

tickertutor: $VFC ... tremendous growth from Timberland segment

Good point. And when you look closely at VF's report, the company also did raise its outlook for the year. So perhaps the stock was falling Monday because expectations were unreasonably high, and not because of concerns about fundamentals. After all, VF Corp. has been a phenomenal stock as of late. Shares are up more than 26% in 2012.