Hat Blog

Customer Service and Family History

 Detroit, Michigan, 1933.  25-year old merchant Irving Belinsky (standing in center with rolled shirt sleeves) in his Film Exhange Drug Store.  

June 29, 2009

I spoke today with my UK based nephew Bruce who heads our newest headwear venture, www.VillageHats.co.uk in London. I encouraged him to hire another employee as our business is doing well and the current staff is maxed out. His reply made me smile because it fit so neatly into our family lore. "The next person I hire would have to help me with customer service," he said. "That could be a problem because nobody in the history of the world has done customer service as well as me." I didn’t say it, but in fact I thought, "no way, no one could be better at customer service than me." My wife Tina – who heads this department at VillageHatShop.com – thinks the same about herself. I know that my now retired brother Arnold, a wildly successful retailer, thinks the same about himself. His three children – all retailers – ditto. Our entire clan was raised on the belief that this customer service impulse was in our blood. We come by this idea courtesy of my father Irving, Bruce’s grandfather, and the now apocryphal stories of the style and manner with which he ran his stores.

Here’s an exemplar: My dad, a pharmacist, was in the drug store business. Though, you would never see him trapped all day behind the pharmacy counter. He was a merchant, not a pill counter. One mid-1940s summer, my brother was working, as usual, at my dad’s store. He observed a customer-let’s call her Mrs. Kowalski-come up to the counter and ask my dad for a particular over-the-counter (non-prescription) preparation. "I’m sorry Mrs. K," my dad replied, "we don’t carry that product." As Mrs. Kowalski began to sag, my dad didn’t miss a beat, ". . . but I will have that for you tomorrow; come back in the morning. " She smiled and with my dad wishing her a good day, she left the store. The following morning, my father roused my brother a half-hour earlier than normal announcing that they had a stop to make on the way to work. Heading in a direction away from the store, my dad stopped at the warehouse of one of his wholesale suppliers. My brother waited in the car while my dad went inside, returning ten minutes later. Off they went to open the store. By and by, Mrs. Kowalski appeared at the counter. My father greeted her, "Good afternoon Mrs. Kowalski." He then reached around the corner and with both his thumbs and index fingers gingerly holding a small tube on each side, slowly presented the product on the counter in front of his customer. "That will be 49-cents please."

Bruce (and all the rest), beat that! We all learned from the master.

Fred Belinsky
www.VillageHatShop.com

Village Hat Shop's Guide to History: The History of Baseball

Click the image for more information about the history of the baseball cap.

Bridging the Classic Tension between the Sciences and the Humanities

Bridging the Classic Tension between the Sciences and the Humanities

or Handling IT Service Guys

 

Running a successful business is more art than science.  Of this, I am quite certain. However, understanding science, specifically technology and perhaps some math - or at least being able to effectively communicate with people who do - is vital.  This is especially true if one’s business is Internet retailing.  If, like me, you are more inclined toward the humanities than the sciences, successful communication with the techies can be a challenge.  [If you are an ecommerce CEO with the luxury of in-house IT staff, skip this blog entry.] 

Here is the persona that often shows up on the telephone when you call for IT service.  The guy (in my experience, the person is almost always as male) will rarely leave his comfort zone.  Before you can even dream of making human contact or chatting about the problem at hand, he’ll want your ID number, your case number, your password, your secret question answered, and perhaps your name (but this might be incidental and he’ll never refer to you by name).   His flat affect will remind you that he is doing this work because he thinks – mistakenly – that he can avoid the messiness of real human affairs.  When it came time to get a job, “Technology Service” was hiring, but unfortunately for him, talking to people was part of the deal.  At one point in his life, he was a “gamer”, a geek who was unpopular and “weird.”  He relished privacy and every single day hoped that people would just leave him alone. 

Now you need his help, and he doesn’t like you from the get-go because you are a. a human being and b. an idiot who doesn’t even know your own IP address or where to find your cookies.  You need a good strategy to get your needs met:  1. Be self-effacing (even if you know a thing or two).  For heaven’s sake, don’t try and sound competent as this will surely get you painted into a corner.  Example: “I am a dummy when it comes to this stuff.  Please go easy on me.”  2.  Build him up:  “Your skills make today’s world go round.  Or the rhetorical, “How could businesses survive without your expertise?” 

This should lay the necessary groundwork.  Now, your goal is to get a single example of any right brain behavior exhibited in the conversation, like humor for example.  If you succeed, don’t over-react as this may signal a retreat.  Rather, validate the behavior in an understated manner.  At this point, you should be home free.  Cautiously navigate your way toward completion of your IT service objective with your new friend. 

Good luck and . . . May the Force be With You (is that what those guys say?  I get the trekkies and techies mixed up).

Fred Belinsky 
www.VillageHatShop.com
www.VillageHats.co.uk

 

 

What I Learned From Marco Polo That Applies to the Current Economic Crisis

If you are disinclined to read this entire article and simply want to know what I learned, it is this: Empires and civilizations come and go, but good merchants survive.  The longer version follows.

My wife’s book club had sent her its latest offering.  She was not picking it up, so, after a few days, I did.   MARCO POLO From VENICE to XANADU by Laurence Bergreen pulled me right in.  Being a merchant, I immediately identified with the Polos (Marco, his father Niccolo, and his uncle Maffeo) who made their way around the world negotiating, forming alliances, and avoiding legal and political trouble.  The requirements for being a successful merchant today have not changed.  To my thinking, merchants are more like craftsmen than they are like bankers.  Banks, financial institutions, and the like are intimately connected with governments, their institutions and their economic policies.  Merchants however exist within and beside any and every economic system ever devised or that ever will be devised.  Marco, Niccolo, and Maffeo Polo were always looking out for the next trading opportunity.  In every country and culture that they traveled through or settled in, their objective was to find the local merchants and trade for goods.  Niccolo and Maffeo did this for 17 years, returned to Venice, and then departed again, this time with 19-year old Marco, for an additional 24 years.  Their adventures were hair-raising; we follow Marco’s coming of age and his maturation as a student of the world. The extraordinary stories were sometimes unimaginable. But all was in the service of their trade.  Whether operating within a rising or falling Mongolia dominated Asia (this was the time of Kublai Khan) or a rising or falling Venice (Marco Polo actually writes the story of his Travels while a prisoner of war in Genoa) – all of which supplied context for the Polos in the late 13th Century – they continued to “do their thing” and prospered. 

These days, as I go out and about, it is apparent that many stores and restaurants are hurting.  As a small businessman, it saddens me to see these businesses failing (no government bailout coming to these folks).  But, what really intrigues me are the, even now, many busy stores and restaurants.  I stand in them and marvel.  What-I ask myself–is this place doing right?  And, what do all busy businesses have in common?  Here are my observations: A. Sell what customers are looking for.  Gone are the days–for now at least–when people can be separated from their money for stuff they didn’t really want or need.  B. A business today must offer authentic value.  For example, no longer can you retail a purse for $1,500 when the materials, workmanship, features, and design ought to make it a $150 purse.  C. Service must be exceptional.  Nothing less will do.  D. A good reputation (brand) helps, but only if A, B, and C are in place. 

There are stores that literally survive hundreds of years through all manner of upheaval.  In my industry for example, Lock & Co. has been a retail hatter in London since 1676 and in the same location–No. 6 St. James Street–since 1764.  Think about what England has gone through these past 333 years.  Like I said at the outset: Empires and civilizations come and go, but responsive, open-minded, and creative merchants - like the Polos - survive. 

Fred Belinsky
VillageHatShop.com
VillageHats.co.uk

Why Unconditional Free Shipping Is Bad For Us

A few years back I was standing by the customer service counter at Staples.  A man walked up and handed the employee an empty ink cartridge for a copy machine.  The “customer” said that he bought the product six months previously but had just now opened the package and determined that the cartridge was empty – no ink.  He didn’t present a receipt or any of the packaging material (these big cartridges come packed in boxes with inner seals).  The employee kept the large empty plastic container, asked no questions, and issued the man a voucher for another cartridge.  When the customer walked away the employee must have seen me roll my eyes.  He volunteered that although he did not believe the man’s story, he did what Staples policy required.  “You see” he said, “that’s Office Depots policy and we have to compete.”

Last week I was at an Internet marketing conference at Google’s Silicon Valley campus.  One of the speakers was a VP who leads the worldwide ecommerce operations of a large corporation that did a billion dollars in revenue in 2008.  After the conference, we sat next to each other on the shuttle to the airport.  The topic turned to free shipping.  He told this story: his 14-year old daughter bought and returned 20 pairs of soccer shoes from Zappos.com before finally keeping a pair.  For those of you who may not know, Zappos is a well-known ecommerce shoe retailer whose marketing strategy has centered on their policy of free shipping and free returns.

I don’t know if Zappos is making money these days (I doubt they did on the soccer shoes customer), but I do know that they were not profitable in their early years and this past November they laid-off 8% of their people.  But whether or not this shipping strategy is sustainable is not my central point.  Zappos is not serving the public good.  Neither is Staples or Office Depot (if that return policy is still in place). Our society needs its people to take a measure of responsibility when an individual enters into a transaction with a merchant.  When people are allowed to behave with impunity in the marketplace, we all eventually pay.  [Think current economic crisis.]

I first saw this problem coming with Nordstrom.  What buzz was created with their take-it-back-no-questions-asked policy.  People competed to out-do each other with their “Who-screwed-Nordstrom-worse-and-Nordstrom-didn’t-care” stories.   It became a kind of shopping joke, while at the same time apparently, a successful marketing strategy for Nordstrom.  For small merchants, this was not a joke.  It was a problem on a par with Wal-Mart opening a store on the outskirts of a small town.  Historically, the fundamental goal for a merchant was to nurture a good relationship with a customer [not unlike a community’s banks].  Nobody was out to cheat anybody: merchants needed customers and people needed stores.  Each side took his/her respective responsibility in the trade.  To lose this nexus means losing a measure of our collective and personal values; unraveling a bit of our social fabric.  Big corporations, not operating on a human scale, “train” customers (like the innocent 14-year old) that our marketplace is neutral on the subject of responsibility in the transaction (the data from computer modeling informs these businesses that these policies can generate more profit given certain assumptions and time frames irrespective of specific transactions).  But for smaller merchants with fairly priced merchandise, unconditional free shipping is unsustainable; human scale and time don’t allow it.

“So what”, you may say.  If you can’t compete, try a monastery or a cave (or go to work for a big corporation).  But it’s not that simple.  Policies like “unconditional free shipping” or “return merchandise with no questions asked” are a bubble (or a deception).  And we have all become experts on the fate of bubbles.   As I am implying, I believe this is not unrelated to all the bad business practices that we all have become aware of and that have gotten us into this current economic mess.  Like lenders loaning us money for homes we couldn’t afford, or credit card companies sending us cards so that we’d go into debt and pay onerous interest rates and fees, this is ultimately (whether intended or not) just another way to dupe us.   

The best merchants on or off line are gimmick free, not shipping free.  I suggest supporting them rather than a business that, because it absolves the customer from acting responsibly, may be both sealing its own fate while simultaneously bringing down its betters.  But the overarching problem is worse-the erosion of our commonweal. 

Fred Belinsky

The Village Hat Shop

VillageHats.co.uk Launches in London

The Village Hat Shop, twenty-eight year-old California-based retailer, operating stores in San Diego, Long Beach, and Sacramento as well as http://www.VillageHatShop.com -- the leading source for hats online -- has launched a sister site in the United Kingdom, http://www.VillageHats.co.uk. 

"We are thrilled to finally have everything in place at our London facility and to be fulfilling orders for our customers in the UK and Europe," said Village Hat Shop founder and president Fred Belinsky. "We are confident that our wide range of hats, now specifically tailored for Europe and the UK, as well as our core mission of customer service will be very well received."

Although VillageHatShop.com has shipped abroad for years, rising freight costs and a USA inventory not entirely aimed at this hat-loving continent have been impediments to the desired and achievable growth in this market. The company felt that moving to the UK so as to be closer to the customer and opening a separate fulfillment center with a Euro-focused inventory would enable the merchant/customer relationship to flourish.

VillageHatShop.com veterans Bruce Zales and Jason Martin have relocated to London and are heading the new venture. "Finally", extols an exasperated but happy Zales. "Getting to this point has taken a lot longer than anticipated and has been complicated, but we have every reason to believe that our basis for this expansion continues to be sound."

Zales is also the lead designer for the company's major private-label brand Jaxon Hats -- http://www.JaxonHats.com -- possessing that rare combination of talents that encompass both business savvy and apparel design.

The Village Hat Shop and Village Hats UK are privately owned and have been led by the same management team since the company's inception in 1980

Fred Belinsky
www.VillageHatShop.com

Jaxon Hats on TV

October, 3 2008

On last night's episode of NBC’s "My Name Is Earl", the JAXON C-Crown Stingy Brim Fedora was part of the story!

On the Episode entitled "Stole an RV", Randy, Ear's younger brother, happens across the hat.

Jaxon Hats will also be featured on upcoming episodes of “Ugly Betty” and “One Tree Hill". Jaxon Hats are regularly seen on MTV.

Hurricane Ike and a Hat

Every once in a while, we receive an email that just needs to be seen by more eyes than our own. Here is one such such email received this month from Michael T. Crawford. Michael has given us permission to reprint it. Here it is, unedited:

Hey gang I wanted to share something with you, on September 12th 2008 at about midnight Hurricane Ike touched ground about 70 miles south of my home and by 3am my neighborhood looked like a war zone. It was the most freighting thing I had ever seen, trees toppling and power lines exploding debris was everywhere and a friend of mine could not get home from Chicago and text me and ask if I would check on his wife and children, when I was leaving the house my wife handed me one of the fedora hats I bought from you guys, I was a little worried about it, it was raining so hard I was sure the hat would be a rag when I got back if it even made it. When I got to the home of my friend only about a mile and a half away (what an adventure that was) they had a generator but did not know how to start it and it was still sitting in the garage, well I drug it to the back yard hooked up chords started it and got them up and running, in the process of all this again the wind is blowing hard enough to knock down big big trees, rip up roof tops and raining so hard it hurt, I was wet through multiple layers of clothing and my hat was soaked but still held it's form and kept my head dry, when I was getting back in my truck to leave it blew off my head and I watched it sail away and was briefly saddened about the loss when it made a turn up in the air about fifty feet away and made a bee line straight for me and I tried to catch it but it smacked me in the face real hard and I just reached for it and smashed it against my chest, when I got in the car I shook it a couple times and put it on my head and returned home, my wife towel dried it put it up and today the hat feathers and all sit with my other hats that I also bought from you and you would not know which hat was in the storm, I never mentioned the color. I have felt grateful a few times since for it's service to me that day, had it blown away it would have still served me well and probably lived to serve another. Thanks for the quality you offer, thanks for being the Village Hat Shop.

Michael T. Crawford
Spring, Texas

Obama & JFK; Neckties & Hats

As a hatter, I find the brouhaha over Barack Obama’s aversion to neckties very reminiscent of a prior day (I am holding back from using the now cliché “déjà vu all over again”). The neckwear industry is certainly holding their collective breath (and likely putting their bucks behind John McCain). John F. Kennedy’s objection to wearing hats is legendary in our industry. As the story goes, JFK killed the hat business. And here’s where the comparison to Mr. Obama and his necktielessness becomes noteworthy, because the fact of the matter is that the trend toward hatlessness had been building since the turn into the 20th Century. Neil Steinberg’s very good book, Hatless Jack: The President, the Fedora, and the History of an American Style debunks the JFK hat murder myth [I suggest the book to anyone interested in the details]. Suffice to say, Kennedy’s preference for going bareheaded was part of a trend that had been building for decades. He did not start the trend – as he is commonly accused - but he did accelerate it. And there surely is a trend towards abandoning neckties. Few men are willingly put on a tie these days. According to Wikipedia, “While still common as late as 1966, between 1967 to 1969 the necktie began falling completely out of fashion nearly everywhere except where required. After a brief fashion resurgence in the 1980s, the 1990s saw the appearance of Internet-based (or dot-com) companies, where most workers did not feel the need for formal dress when facing clients, since the business's public image and appearance was websites rather than face-to-face meetings. There also was a sentiment of independence (general liberalism) and a new way of doing things.” Media pundits are fond of making comparisons between JFK and Obama. Well, here is another. If Barack Obama makes it to the White House, history may very likely blame Mr. O for neckwear going out of fashion. Like Kennedy and hats, it won’t be true. But, he certainly may give the current disinclination for wearing neckties a big boost. Now, if he’d just put on a hat.

Fred Belinsky www.VillageHatShop.com

The Fourth Annual Del Mar Pre-Race Day Betmar Hats Trunk Show

                             The Village Hat Shop & Betmar Hats

in anticipation of Opening Day at Del Mar 

presents

The Fourth Annual Pre-Race Day Trunk Show 

Saturday, July 12th

11am-2pm

at The Village Hat Shop in Seaport Village. 

 

Kimberli MacKay, Director of Design at Betmar, will be flying in from New York to help head up the event.  Customers will have the chance to meet with Kimberli, chat with her about her designs, the fashion industry in general or, most importantly, to have a hat selected "just for her". 

   

She will be bringing with her preview pieces from the 2009 Spring /Summer dress line.  Attendees will not only have the chance to sneak a peek of what designs are in store for next year, but will also have the chance to buy these hats, thus making their purchase "one-of-a-kind" until the line is formally released next spring. 

    

We will also have 50 of Betmar's custom high-quality hat boxes on hand, which are only available at trunk shows, to be given to the first 50 customers who buy a Betmar dress hat that weekend.

 

www.VillageHatShop.com