Garment Dyed/Washed Cotton Suit

Believe it or not, we have been working on perfecting the above garments for over a year. The photo on the right, is a cotton suit in it's "Greige" state, or "Ready for Garment Dying". The suit on the left is the final result.

We have not only Dyed the suit, we have also given the suit a light wash to give it a slight Patina or what the market place will call Vintage. We love this slightly disheveled look and this suit is now something that we live in and wear practically everyday.

I remember in the 1960's and 70's going every Spring with my Grandfather to get his new cotton suits. Of course he always and a tan, then would add olive, navy and stone. Then every so often, when he felt daring he would add a pincord or seersucker.

This is the modern version of this suit that my grandfather wore. The good news, it isn't just for Spring and Summer anymore. We will have it Chocolate and Navy (plus 5 other colors), with a great woven shirt and a fine gauge cashmere sweater will be perfect for this winter!

Final samples have arrived, now it is time to put production into work. Look for them on the web by Mid August. Also more professional photo's coming soon and wait until we show you what we have done with Cashmere in this same jacket! You will flip out.

Fall 2009

I was talking with a reporter from the retail industry this morning and she wanted to know if people were calling us crazy for relaunching a brand in the economic times that we are currently in. We also had a great discussion about Fall 2009.

In our discussion about Fall 2009, I mentioned the fact that it is well reported that Retail Inventories are down significantly. The question that everyone has, will the consumer not be inspired because they don't have the quantity to choose from? I posed the question, which is more important, will the consumer recognize a shift in the quality of products?

I say this, because it has also been well reported that most major apparel brands have been developing new opening price points for their retail partners. There has been a focus from the retailers to get their current brand/supply chain to come up with an new opening price point that will keep shoppers in the store. Some would call this "trading down", of course at retail we do not like this word and we have spun this as "not trading down", because the shopper is still buying the same brand.

What has not been reported is all the Margin Guarantee money that was supplied to retailers from their Wholesale partners last Fall, after the blood bath that everyone took. This meant a major shift in margins for the wholesale community. This, coupled with these new "Opening Price Points" mean only one thing, a major shift in the quality of products hitting the store shelves for Fall 2009.

If you think about this, manufacturing got killed last year by writing the checks back to the retailers for their margin guarantee, then for Fall 2009, the retailer has also asked for a lower price point. This can only mean one thing, the manufacturer has to take something out of the product to hit this lower price point, then they have to take out more, to make sure that if the same thing happens this year, that happened last year, they have the margin in the product to write the check to cover the margin guarantee.

So, you ask are we crazy for relaunching now, I would say absolutely not. We have focused all of our energy into making the BEST products, yet achieve Retail Price points that are attainable.

What do you think, do consumers get inspired by the mass quantities, or do they get inspired by GREAT PRODUCT. We are voting on the product.

What do you think?

Web up and Running

The new site is up and running! www.skuhlman.com

Fresh styles, done in the s.kuhlman way, we hope you enjoy. Remember that the site is in Beta, however we are working on it daily to add new and improved features.

In the coming weeks you will be able to add comments on the products and we look forward to what you think.

We are bringing to the market, products that we want to wear, that have the Anglo-Italian styling that we experience in Europe, however we add our American Twist! Happy shopping.