Mortimer Levitt was a legend in the world of menswear.  I always considered it a compliment that he chose us to make some of his personal clothing.  Mr. Levitt was the founder and operator of “Custom Shop Shirtmakers. He was a marketing genius.  It began with his choice of the name ” Custom Shop Shirtmakers.” By my definition nothing they made was custom. Through the years I had a number of “sit downs” with Mr. Levitt.  At one of our meetings I raised the question of what is custom and what is not custom. He said that if someone picked out a cloth and selected the way the shirt was to be detailed- collar style, cuff style, etc. - and they measured the customer for neck size, sleeve length and body size, that the shirt produced was custom. By his definition the fact that they applied the measurements to block patterns did not make them something other than custom.  We sell shirts that are made for us by a  custom shirt-maker . By Mr. Levitt’s definition we are selling custom shirts.  We say we are selling “Ready Made” shirts. Through the years I have had customers ask me if they were getting a “good deal” by buying shirts from the Custom Shop Shirtmakers.  My answer was, and always will be about any product an individual purchases anywhere, if you are pleased with what you got for the money you spent, you got a “good deal”.

Mr. Levitt died at the age of 98.  He sold the Custom Shop Shirtmakers before his passing. He was very generous in his support of the Arts.

In the 60’s many made a trip to Norwalk, CT to buy Gant shirts at Decker’s.  When Decker’s opened it was a small store and it sold Gant shirts which were purportedly “seconds”.  Decker’s was owned by the Gant Shirt Company. Only a few insiders and family friends knew that Moe Decker didn’t own Decker’s. He did run it and was responsible for it’s success.  The shirts were priced at about 25% below retail.  This meant the Gant brothers made more per shirt selling them at Decker’s than they made when they sold their shirts to Chipp, Bloomingdales, etc.  At the begining the shirts were “seconds”. As the business grew they needed more shirts than the number of seconds that the maufacturing process produced.  Many of the “seconds” were now really first run shirts. A pretty good deal. Under Moe Decker’s guidence the “outlet” grew - offereing sweaters, ties, women’s wear, and men’s clothing.  They expanded and ended up in what was a large former food market- an A & P ? I really don’t remember if it was an A & P or another chain. Shirts became a secondary product. Back then Decker’s clothing merchandise really was end of the season close outs of first run products, not products that were created to be sold at “discount prices.” Moe Decker was a close friend, as were Marty and Elliot Gant. Moe would call us when he made a buy of women’s Pringle cashmere sweaters, etc so that our wives could buy these products at a better price than that at which we could buy them.  By the end of Decker’s run “discounting” had changed drastically.  The nationwide hunger for discounted products greatly exceeded the quantity of end of the season items that could be purchased by discount operations from manufacturers.  This gave rise to the production of products being made specifically for the discount market.  It also gave rise to the counterfeit clothing industry.  Moe related to me that periodically a truck would pull up to the Decker’s loading dock and someone would come in and ask him if he wanted to buy what they were selling.  When he asked whose merchandise it was the answer was, ” Whose merchandise do you want it to be?”. They had a sewing machine in the back of the truck and labels from all the major stores- Saks, Bloomindales, Bonwit, etc.  Moe Decker would never buy anthing from them.  Another entry to be filed under “Things are not always what they seem to be.”

Chipp, Brooks Brothers, J Press, and Bloomingdales all carried Allen Solly knit polo shirts in the ancient past- the 50’s and 60’s. Bloomingdales was at the height of their popularity. Allen Solly made two qualities of polo shirts- Full Fashioned and Cut&Sewn.  The Full Fashioned polo shirt had no pocket.  The Cut & Sewn polo shirt had a pocket. The retail price for the Full Fashioned shirt was $14.40 and the Cut & Sewn shirt sold fpr $9.50. The great majority of the buying public did not know what full fashioned meant. What they knew was that the shirt without the pocket was more expensive.  Bloomingdale’s was Allen Solly’s largest customer.  They had Allen Solly make the Cut & Sewn shirt for them with no pocket.  Allen Solly would not do that for anyone else. Periodically I would overhear a customer pointing out to a companion that we were selling our Allen Solly shirts for $14.50 and that Bloomingdales was selling the same shirt for $9.50. When I heard someone make that statement I would explain that they were not the same shirt and explain the difference in the two shirts.  I always wondered how many people thought the same silently.  Another example of how misleading marketing can be.

(Allen Solly exists today in name only. They discovered they could make more money “renting” their name than they could make producing shirts and hose. Ultimately they sold the name.)

Years ago to shop in a “discount outlet” required a trip to Freeport, Maine.  Back then- I am talking about the 1960s- the Freeport outlets were truly a place where end of the season first run merchandise was sent and sold at significant markdowns. Size ranges were broken- sometime only  one or two sizes of an item.  Today outlets are a way of life.  The question I ask myself is do most people think they are getting reduced prices or do they feel what they are getting is convenience- one location with many shops. I am talking about the “discount outlets”, not the many malls selling full price products. When the discount outlet explosion began the promotions all inferred that one was getting a discount for the same merchandise that one would have purchased at a New York City store. Why were you getting the discount ? Because these were overproductions.  When my 3 children were in school, mid 1980s, my wife took our family on an excursion to the Woodbury Common outlet, which is located north of NYC. The place is huge. The lot must park a few thousand cars- ( that figure is a guess).  The place is so huge that they give you a map.  On the back of the map was a list of the other places where the Chelsea Premium Outlet Group had similar malls.  Back then they had about 10.  The shops all had signs to highlight the “deals”. Some signs said ” Compare to ******/ what ever that means. My wife is very intelligent.  She has a masters degree and she was a buyer at Saks Fifth Avenue.  I asked her if she really thought all the merchandise in all these stores was first run overages or if she thought this was merchandise “created” for the outlets. Much to my surprise she was very willing to think she was getting bargains.  Even very smart people can be fooled.  People often believe what they want the case to be.

Periodically there is something that over rides all thoughts of things sartorial. On the heels of , with the exception of SouthWest Airlines, industry wide charges for baggage, Spirit Airlines announced they will be charging $45 for carry-on bags.  They have said they will not charge if you want to carry on an umbrella, a jacket, a hat or a magazine. I am not sure if the “or” limits you to one of those items or if you can carry on one of each item. A European airline, Ryanair, announced they are now charging $1.35 to use the lavatory. If  you don’t have exact change they will probably make a surcharge for making change. It is recommended that one combine ALL body eliminations to one trip, thereby avoiding duplicate charges.  I am going to call a few airlines tomorrow to see if I can secure the license to install toll booths at the entrances to the Aircraft Loading Bridge Extenders.  The start-up costs will be high. There will be an announcement concerning a public stock offering.  I am looking for volunteers to serve on the board of the fledgling company.

For those flying Spirit and who will be taking advantage of being permitted to carry on a jacket, may I suggest one of our Tussah Silks- we have 12 colors.

The year was 1987.  After his suit fitting  Mr. Cook said he wanted to talk to me about our dog breed ties. I asked him what breed of dog he owned .  He said he didn’t own a dog.  He wanted to put our ties in his mail order catalog- The Joan Cook Catalog, which was a housewares catalog that had never run a necktie.  Mr. Cook had been a customer for a few years, but I didn’t know anything about the Joan Cook Catalog.  He asked me if we would be able to drop ship.  I enjoy challenges.  I asked him how many ties he anticipated selling.  He said 200 - 300. I told him we would have no problem handling it.  He told me he was going to put the ties into the Fall and Christmas catalogs. In mid-August the first Joan Cook Catalog went into the mail.  We received the first orders two weeks later.  My wife called to tell me our mail box was the recipient of three big manilla envelopes containing a total of 225 orders.  I called Mr. Cook and told him I was surprised with the number of orders we received.  He said it was what he expected- between 200 - 300. It was a misunderstanding on my part.  I thought he meant 200 - 300 ties for the run of the catalog form September to January.  Mr. Cook meant 200 - 300 per week.  It ended up that he was low on his estimate.  One week we hit more than 900 ties. My kids, and a number of their highschool friends, spent a lot of time in our basement as members of the “Chipp2 Shipping Department”.

The only thing that speaks to the quality of a garment is quality itself.  There was a time when certain details spoke to the fact that a garment was bespoke or made-to-measure.  Working sleeve button holes, hand picked edges, lap seams, peak lapels- off the rack clothing never had the aforementioned.  The reason was surgeon’s sleeves, hand picked edges and lap seams increased the production cost, and peak lapels were too sophisticated for the general public.  Thus you did not see these details in broadbased off the rack clothing.  With the lion’s share of clothing now being produced off shore in low cost labor markets, the extra production cost has been reduced to pennies.  The producers of low end clothing incorporate these details because they always stood for quality. But you can not turn a pigs ear into a silk purse.  The measure of quality still remains a combination of good cloth and quality tailoring.  The “bells and whistles” don’t change that.  When an individual buys a jacket with working sleeve button holes, he often opens himself to expensive alteration costs. If you need a sleeve adjustment  very little can be done from the sleeve end if there are open button holes. This means the adjustment must be made from the shoulder, which is much more costly. Buyer beware!

When I joined Chipp our primary shirt supplier was Gant. We sold Gant  shirts for $7.50.  We also carried shirts made by The Troy Shirtmakers Guild.  Troy Guild shirts sold for the princely price of $14.50.  Troy was run by two fine gentlemen- Bill Archer and Don Donovan. Bill Archer was the president and he took great pride in the product they produced.  Troy shirts were considered as good as you could get.  ( The Troy Guild “name” still exists today; but “The Troy Shirtmakers Guild” is a memory from the past.  “Whats in a name” will be the subject for another day.) Once in a while there would be a small production error- sleeves that were a little longer or shorter than called for. I would call the Troy offrice.  If Don Donovan came over he woud examine the problem shirt/shirts, acknowledge it and have it corrected.  If Bill Archer came over it was a different story.  He would never admit that Troy made a mistake.  I remember, with a smile, the time Mr. Archer came over because we had a few shirts returned by a customer because the sleeves were shorter than marked.  Mr. Archer stretched the sleeves- I thought he was going to pull them off the body of the shirt. Then he measured them and declared they were the proper length. Not withstanding Mr. Archer’s defensiveness, Troy shirts were great. Today I see shirts selling for 10 and 20 times the price of the old Troy shirts that are not close to as good.  I am still wearing a few Troy shirts that are 50 years old! They are a tad tight.

In my entry of March 10,2010 I allude to “projection” and “perception”. Physicists tell us everything we see is an illusion created by our senses.  About 99.99% of everything one “sees” is space- the space between atoms is vast compared to their size.  That means when I show a customer the beautifu J&J Minnis flannel plaids what we are seeing is a mutual creation of our immaginations.

Winston Tailors addresses a “niche” clientel.  There was a brief meteoric period in the 60s when what we were doing became mainstream.  To say it is not mainstream today is an understatement.  When I perused the New York Times Style Magazine- Men’s Fashion Spring 2010- I felt like I was an interloper to a strange world.  My customers wouldn’t want the overwhelming majority of the “Fashions” pictured if you gave it to them for free.  I have never felt the word “fashion” pertained to our business. We have served gentleman and women who want traditional clothing.  The common thread that my customers share is security in knowing what they want.  They do not all want the same thing.  What they want marches to their individual drummers with no regard to what is “in”.  And prices listed for some of the featured items make me feel time has passed me by- ties for $195, ready made trousers for $900.  I find certain prices inappropriate.  Alas, I would be better off if I did not remember what prices were years ago.