Advice for Would-Be Vegan Designers, Part 4 July 17, 2009

This article in Wednesday’s New York Times reminded me that I’ve been meaning to issue a serious warning to aspiring designers.

Specifically, a warning about some retailers’ unpleasant habit of stiffing their suppliers.

As the article explains, Jake, a hot Chicago luxury fashion boutique, owes a LOT of money to a number of suppliers. They aren’t the first store that has failed to pay designers for goods received, and sadly, they will not be the last.

Some retailers stop paying the bills when money gets tight. However, some don’t pay the bills if they can possibly avoid it in the first place.

As usual, this is one of the things they warned us about in fashion school…some retailers don’t pay up even if they can. One instructor noted that smaller stores are more prone to cash-flow problems (and, therefore, past-due bills) than larger chains. There is a grain of truth to this (Tina Aldatz-Norris, founder of Foot Petals, ran into cash flow issues because a third of her customers were late on payments – and at that point most of her business came from small stores). However, the big guys can still be the bad guys.

Case in point: Barneys. Yes, you read that right. Back in the early ’90s, Barneys developed a bad habit of not paying designers (or contractors, artisans, etc.). In The Rise and Fall of the House of Barneys, author Joshua Levine explains the paradox this created for new designers:

“For young designers, the chance to showcase their talent in Barneys could propel an entire career…It was often a life-and-death gamble. Barneys always demanded an exclusive on the merchandise it carried, meaning the designer couldn’t sell to any other store…

In the case of a fledgling designer, Barneys could usually make its demands stick. So when the checks never came, many of these designers had no other source of income to see them through.

Stores know that new designers with limited income frequently don’t have the means to sue them for failing to pay, and that if they are silent for long enough, the designer may very well abandon hope.

Levine goes on to note that smaller designers often work with factors, which advance their payment for a fee and then collect the designers’ accounts receivable. This allows them to start production on the next shipment without having to wait for whoever buys the goods to pay (and it’s not unheard of for stores to pay 90 days after receiving the goods, so this can make a huge difference in the amount of product they can release!).

While there are factors that are happy to work with startups, it’s common for factors to require that a supplier be able to ship $75,000 to $100,000 per year. Some have lower volume requirements, but for working with a factor to be worthwhile, designers really must move a certain amount of product, and for very small businesses, doing so might not be worth the expense. (For more information on factors, read The Fashion Designer Survival Guide by Mary Gehlhar.)

As I’ve said in previous entries, we live in the age of lawsuits, and stiffed designers often can’t afford to risk going public with a list of who owes them money. Do so at your own risk.

It’s technically possible to insist upon payment in full before shipping the goods, but a lot of stores (accustomed to a 30-day, 60-day, or 90-day payment deadline) don’t like this, and may refuse to work with you.

As both a designer by training and a retailer, the practice of not paying suppliers on time annoys me, and the very idea of stiffing them completely makes me nauseous. (How do those people sleep at night?)

I’m square with my suppliers. On one occasion when the store was only a few months old, I had to ask a major supplier to delay shipment for a couple of weeks so we could come up with the funds to pay them. I didn’t like not having the newest product available immediately, sure, but I am just not comfortable with not paying promptly.

If only all retailers felt that way.

You Know the Fashion World is in a Funk When… February 13, 2009

…even Betsey Johnson, a major creative voice in the field since the 1960s, has forgone a Fashion Week tent at Bryant Park in lieu of a smaller, more subdued, “presentation.”

Betsey freaking Johnson, who has proclaimed that she will be sporting lipstick even on her deathbed, puts leopard/lace/tulle/sequins in pretty much every collection, and is the only designer who can get away with doing cartwheels on the catwalk (something most 66-year-old women rarely, if ever, do).

I never thought I’d see the day when Betsey, the last remaining designer who personifies the exuberance of the “Think Pink” number in “Funny Face,” scaled back on her shows, which, while fun and stylish, were hardly ostentatious in the first place. They were a little over the top, but only in spirit.

This is not good, and it’s not shaping up to be a fun Fashion Week.

Much in the way that the December holidays create extra jobs (Christmas tree lots, mall Santas, temporary ice rinks, extra retail clerks, gift wrappers), Fashion Week generates a sizable chunk of the year’s income for those in industries that support the fashion world. Those benefiting from Fashion Week include dressers (usually broke fashion students making $20 per show), florists, makeup artists, hairdressers, sound and lighting technicians, equipment rental companies, security guards, models, paparazzi snapping pictures of celebrity attendees, and extra seamstresses brought in to help get every last garment finished in time for the show. When Fashion Week is scaled back, those people lose income. It’s an unpleasant situation that the New York Press kindly took the time to examine up close earlier this week.

The fashion world has many, many flaws – too-thin models, toxic chemical processes, still not enough organic stuff, real fur (eeew!), sweatshops galore, polluting third-world factories, declining quality, and retailers who give their lower-level employees five six-hour shifts a week so they don’t have to give them proper lunch breaks or any full-time benefits (naming no names, but they know who they are – and you probably do too). But, when so many people depend upon it for income, turning one’s back on fashion is not the answer. It just makes a lousy situation worse.

Will I personally profit from Fashion Week? Probably not. Well, not directly anyway. I will be watching videos of all the shows when they’re posted online, of course – I need to stay current, and some of the most diehard fashion junkies will somehow find a way to get their fashion fix, economy be damned (bless them!).

Like most apparel retailers, I’m hoping the stylish Michelle Obama will breathe some new life into fashion in America and abroad, but even the influence of our glamorous First Lady only goes so far. Can she do it alone? In a stable economy, sure, but in a bad one it would be a stretch even for the late Jackie O.

God, it’s all so depressing. The only thing cheering me up today is the upcoming first-ever Hello Kitty fashion show.

P.S. Still no sign of Spanky. I can’t believe the little guy really is gone.

Monday. Blah. January 26, 2009

Still no sign of Spanky. I’m told my parents’ other cat, a Japanese bobtail/American shorthair/whatever mix named Darla, has been crying nonstop since he vanished. Darla’s usually crabby and has been really mean to Spanky at times (think Linus and Lucy from “Peanuts”), but she loves him, too (think Linus and Lucy, again). I have to marvel at some individuals’ wacky idea that animals don’t have feelings.

Dead quiet today. Come on, you guys can’t ALL be broke…

Re-stocked the shelves in Westwood over the weekend for all you LA people who hate making the trip behind the Orange Curtain. If you don’t see the size or style you want, try our website. (Why do LA residents hate coming to Orange County so much? It may be a bit of a drive, but the shopping’s good, parking is plentiful, traffic is much lighter, some of our beaches are really nice, and we have Disneyland.)

I’m not feeling too chipper today, but I am excited that Bones is getting a vegan character (link warning: SPOILERS!) in the future. I’m not sure if I’ll watch the episode discussed in the Bones Spoiler Blog when it airs, as the subject matter depresses me…I might watch Ugly Betty instead, since the two shows are now airing at the same time (aaargh!), and catch Bones online later (then I can fast-forward through any particularly irritating scenes – no, I don’t have a DVR – and the blog was a little unclear on whether the vegan character was appearing in that episode or not). The entertainment world needs more vegan and vegetarian characters – good ones, not the walking stereotypes that make closed-minded omnivores snicker. Given that costar Emily Deschanel is vegan, I imagine the writers will be able to create a great vegan character.

New Flagship Store Hours January 12, 2009

Due to the current economic situation, we’ve trimmed the store hours in Costa Mesa (it’s wasteful to run the lights and computer all evening if you people aren’t shopping, you know). Westwood’s hours will stay the same (unless Native Foods is forced to start closing earlier), and shophumanitaire.com is always available 24/7.

The current flagship store hours are:

M-F 11am – 6pm
Sat. 11am – 7pm
Sun. 11am – 4pm

If the store answering machine message lists different hours, ignore it. We’ve re-recorded the message dozens of times, but we’re mysteriously receiving the occasional claim that the message lists the original hours. We have no idea what’s going on with that thing, but please ignore it. All other information on the message is still current.

You Can’t Squeeze Blood out of a Turnip January 8, 2009

Why do people think I have unlimited funds?

Yesterday some hip young stylist tried to sell me a salon package deal. Yes, $45 for four visits is a good value, IF you can risk spending $45. Which, because sales are so sluggish (hello, customers? where are you?), I don’t dare. I’ve been cutting my own hair for the past three years. Good thing I used to work for a hairdresser with a special teaching license and have a pair of hair-cutting shears; otherwise it would be obvious that I cut my own hair (it’s not as easy as it sounds, and if you use the wrong kind of scissors, you’ll get horrible split ends).

News flash, people: nobody in retail has any money because YOU, the public, aren’t buying. If you put off buying things you need, not just things you want, that doesn’t do you or the economy any favors. I’ve lost track of the sheer number of young kids who come in with ratty sneakers and decide to wait to replace them because the style they like hasn’t gone on sale yet. If you refuse to buy anything that isn’t on the clearance rack, stores’ profit margins suffer tremendously. I’ve already had to cut store hours for the second time in 8 months.

Ironically, most people aren’t affected much by the credit crunch, and many aren’t suffering at all. Yet, they’ve chosen to take on a mindset of poverty. I may not be an economist, but even I know that is only making everything a lot worse.

If I had money, I’d run right out the door and go stimulate the economy. I’m sleeping on a leaky air mattress (my “real” mattress is so old it finally started rotting), sitting on a too-small settee with upholstery fabric that won’t stay stapled and an arm that’s about to fall off, and wearing the same 10 things again and again and again because my clothing budget is so small it only covers new underwear (area secondhand shops have been picked to death by “broke” hipster kids with trust funds).

Now, I dread answering the phone (I’m always across the room helping someone when the darn thing rings anyway, but you know what I mean) because most of the time it’s a sales rep trying to sell me yet another product my customers won’t buy for one reason or another. And I’ll be damned if the economy hasn’t made some salespeople much pushier than usual. It’s frustrating enough that there is apparently no nice way to tell people “my customers won’t buy that”, but now nobody will take “no thank you” for an answer or stop calling.

Help me stop the madness, people. Make some kind of contribution to the economy. It doesn’t even have to be “stuff” – hire a cleaning lady for your messy house, take your family to a restaurant once a month, buy carbon offsets. Just do something, please, before every independent retailer in America is forced to move into the back room of the store she runs.

All I Want for Christmas December 12, 2008

Dear Santa,

I have to admit that, being a 27-year-old woman of a logical/rational nature, I’ve long believed you don’t exist.

But, I’m in a bit of a pickle this year, so if you are at all real I need help. You know I’ve been good. Help a lady out.

You know about the economy and how it’s killing off small businesses left and right. I have worked my arse off to get the store open and keep it open. It’s not a good time to be job hunting, let alone job hunting in the fashion industry, so I need business to stabilize enough to stay open.

My family needs money and a miracle – you know about that.

Peace on Earth and an end to animal/human exploitation would make me happy enough to forget my own troubles.

My perennially aching back needs a new bed and a couch that doesn’t stab my derriere with yet another popped spring every time I try to sit on it.

I could really use the money the probate court (still!) owes me – you saw the huge pile of ill-fitting clothes I recently donated to charity, plus the ratty old jeans I sent to the Habitat for Humanity denim insulation drive. I really do need some newer clothes that actually fit (clothing swaps are not an option when you are taller and much more well-endowed than all of your girlfriends).

I’ve been coughing and sneezing for weeks due to the combination of lousy air quality and unsealed windows in my tiny bachelorette pad; a good air purifier would be nice.

Also, I could use some help picking out a gift for The Boyfriend that I can actually afford.

Well? What say you, Mr. Claus?

L.

Why is it… September 19, 2008

…that some people think I’m a rich trust-fund brat or something to that effect?

Seriously, I’m not. Prissy? Sure. Rich? I wish!

I live in a neighborhood that has taken a dive in the past two years. I do not have luxuries like cable TV or a working set of speakers. I’ve been sleeping on an air mattress with a slow leak for months because I have needed a new bed for years and don’t yet have the funds to replace the beat-up, sagging one I’ve had since 1986, which has probably made my back problems even worse. I can’t even get our static-plagued phone line fixed (the phone company refused to install the line and doesn’t consider it their problem, and we had to fire the tech guy who did).

Rising fuel costs and the crumbling dollar have been killing small retailers for the past several months. I have worked way too hard on this business to throw in the towel, so I am standing my ground.

I was raised to believe that talking about money was vulgar (exceptions: discussions with financial consultants, accountants, bank loan officers, etc. and setting family budgets – and even then it should be kept brief). Haggling? Fit only for the flea markets (and even there I refuse to do it on principle). In our culture, one builds a relationship with a vendor over time and if they extend any special offers, great. (And believe me, if you patronize a good one really well for at least a few years it’s more likely to happen.) If not, one certainly shouldn’t be so rude as to ask. Really, cheapening things has killed and buried Main Street USA.

I realize not everyone is going to share my values and ethics, but that’s hardly an excuse for such disrespectful behavior.

And I’m not the only vegan retailer with similar feelings.

On an unrelated note, I cried buckets watching BONES the other night. If I had the space, funds, time, and landlord’s permission for a dog I probably would have started looking up dog rescue groups. I am rather fond of my best friend’s dog, a Dalmatian/pit mix she found abandoned on the side of a desert highway.