How hip-hop fashion won over mainstream America - Threads 4 Life Corp.; includes related article - 21st Annual Report on Black Business: B.E. 100s Company of the Year

Black Enterprise, June, 1993 by Shelley Branch

Just how well this new mystique will play in stores, however, remains to be seen. Other menswear makers have tried similar tactics and failed. For instance, Tommy Hilfiger (a label that Cross Colours hopes to compete against) moved its logo on rugbies from the breast pocket to the hem. Hilfiger swiftly moved it back north, though, after retailers complained that the shirts weren't selling as well.

Asked about their competition, both Walker and Jones demur. "We'd like to think that we don't have any," says Jones. They're holding back. In fact, their former Surf Fetish partners--the ones, remember, who Jones says snickered at his original concept--have launched Tag Rag, a line that takes a direct swipe at Cross Colours with its colors, silhouettes, even its message: "Tag Rag Speaks a Colorful Language All Its Own.... Positiveness." Other imitators (which tend to sell for less) include Russell Simmons' Phat Farm and Global Ghetto, both based in New York City.

So what do retailers think of the also-rans? "We run a two-tiered business," says Eric Wical, buyer for Joppa, Md. -based Merry-Go-Round stores. "Those that can't afford the original will accept the look-alike. Adds store owner Ron Robinson: "I can't name any real imitators. And as long as there's a Cross Colours look, we'll want Cross Colours."

Cross Colours' greatest potential threat, though, is now an ally. Jones discovered 25-year-old Karl Kani two years ago, when Kani (a.k.a. Carl Williams) was working in a cramped L.A. studio and sweating to fill orders for his hot-selling low-slung jeans. The day after shaking hands on a deal for joint ownership of the Kani name, Jones put the kid with the gold-toothed smile to work.

"Since [Jones] has a good eye, he decided that the Karl Kani kid was a comer, and he was right," says Oaktree's Tucker. "His major competition is sitting in the office right next to him, and that's brilliant, to compete against himself." Tucker may be on the money. Last year, in less than six months of shipping, Karl Kani toted up $6 million. Sales for the line, which has been expanded to include leather jackets and accessories, are expected to hit $34 million in 1993.

So far, the clothing lines have racked up big sales without a major advertising push. Cross Colours spent less than $1 million on ads last year and plans to spend little more for 1993. Says Jones: "We don't plan to ever do a lot." Why? The CEO feels the company is already reaching its market by advertising in each of the major black publications and showing up in MTV videos.

Indeed, the company's significant celebrity exposure is probably the best billboard a CEO could hope for. "We work really hard to get the right people to wear our clothes at the right time," explains Jones, who describes his target customer as between ages 12 and 30 and "very much influenced by entertainment." Current clients include pop newcomer Ce Ce Peniston, George Clinton, Big Daddy Kane and Arsenio Hall.

The celebrity connection, though, hasn't come without a few headaches. There was talk last year of Magic Johnson joining Cross Colours as an equity partner. Negotiations changed course, and Johnson emerged instead as an endorsee of the New Classics line. (Both parties say they're still talking.) Then there was the Spike Lee debacle. Lee, who was once a client, last year filed suit against Cross Colours, presumably over the use of several slogans: "Ya Dig" (both Cross Colours and Lee used it in promotional material) and "Joint" (Cross Colours' parent company was originally called "Solo Joint"; Lee's movies are billed as "a Spike Lee Joint"). Cross Colours has since settled the case--for undisclosed terms--and changed the name of its parent company to Threads 4 Life.