The Magic has left Las Vegas...almost.

Trade show season is coming to a close this week with the mother (or in this case, grandmother) of all shows, MAGIC. With a month full of airplanes, convention centers, hotel rooms, high fives, and promises of orders to be submitted on time (which of course they wont be), I finally have time to do a bit of a re-cap and maybe some forecasting. First and foremost, the only shows at all relevant to today's market are Agenda, which runs concurrent to the ASR (or Action Sports Retailer) Goliath



, Class in Santa Monica, and Project in Las Vegas. For those still living under a stone (or a Volcom Stone, for that matter), ASR pretty much caters to the brand loyal skate and surf crowd. Predictable offerings from Billabong, Hurley, LRG, and the like hustle their goods to a few key accounts like Active in Southern Ca and Milo Sport in Utah and the Bay Area, and Ronin right down the road from us. Speaking of Ronin...


The best Dave I know.

Back to ASR...


Skateboarding's silly!


Oh snap! It's 316. Maybe you'll see Rob Dyrdek eating a Famous Star?



Babes! Awesome!

Agenda, on the other hand, is pretty much the bees knees of street fashion (which I've decided to say instead of my second least favorite buzzword "streetwear"). 10 Deep, Alife, WESC, Stussy, and other top tier street focused brands congregate a few blocks from ASR and shuttle attendees back and forth between shows. A great way to go if you're going to bypass mega-show MAGIC's street selection "SLATE". Small, but cozy, Agenda manages to turn out some really solid representation from more current accounts across the nation. Hosted by the Agenda Showroom in LA, these guys know how to select the right brands and invite the right accounts.



We opted to skip out on Agenda this year (we'll be back in the Fall though), and of course didn't attend ASR, but we absolutely had to get to Class. The good folks at the Derelicte Showroom throw a hell of a show, and even comped our flights and hotel stay, which made the deal even better. Thanks LizKim, Drew, Kelsey, JW, and of course MrBates, for the invite. Class was a great mix of solid staples such as WESC, Rivet De Cru, PF Flyers (Adams likes to party), and Insight, and fresh lines from Post'age, MG Black, J Lindeberg, and others. We stopped by the Naked and Famous booth and met the most stoked out Canadian in the world, with one of the best denim lines in the world to boot. Look for N&F to hit the floor in mid-March. The setting for the show was great as well. Santa Monica is celeb-o-rama and we managed to come across some familiar faces.


Forrest Whittaker

Cliff Curtis

THE COOLEST MAN IN SHOW BUSINESS, THE MILLER HIGH LIFE GUY



With some time to kill on the last day we rented bikes and cruised from Santa Monica to Venice. If you haven't been to Venice it's a must see. We stopped at the legendary Venice courts where Billy Hoyle punked Sidney Deane.



You can also see an army of bums getting stoned and fighting trash cans while naked. Awesome.

A few weeks after getting back from Class, the wife, baby, and I were back on a plane to Las Vegas for Magic, Project, Pool, and Guild. Just like a Tyler Perry movie, Magic was boring and without an audience. Aisles were empty, which was a far cry from the jam packed booths of the last several years. I guess "this economy" (my 1st least favorite buzzword), has finally taken its toll on the industry giant leaving booths empty and reps scratching their heads. Just when I thought all had been lost, the most hated man in New York (not Bernie Madoff) popped into the 10 Deep booth and interrupted my appointment.



I guess I'll let this one go Stephon. I still got love for Starbury! You know Magic has officially died when the Arab Parrot won't even show his beak.



Outside the sea of neon shoes, raw denimz, and flying cartoon gun tees that permeate SLATE is the rest of MAGIC: "hip hop" clothing from department store giants Sean John, LRG, and Roca Wear, the Denios Auction section with 2 Pac tees and 5 for $10 belts, and the flat billed fitted cap segment known as "FamousTapFightOutKillRaaar!". If motocross and cagefighting is your thing, this is your Mecca.



Thankfully Christian Audgier moved his brands to their own show at Cesar's, humbly named "when I move you move". I can only imagine the blinding sequins and glittering rhinestones as we sadly didn't have time to see Ed Hardly and all the other Liberace conceptualized collections. While we'll get WAY into this subject later in this post, when the fuck did it become "cool" for guys to stop dressing like men and look like this?


Cute leg pose on the left.

It's especially cool when one of these guys calls someone else a "fag". Talk about the pot calling the kettle black on some next level hypocrisy.

"Ed Hardy" is in Costco and Michaels Arts and Crafts by the way. Time to move on again! Von Dutch: dead. Ed Hardy: dead. Smet: dying. See a trend? It's a business model by the marketing mogul Christian Audigier.



First step, celebrity endorsements and bro-down photos.


Second step, general pop introduction (and fatter b-list celebs jump on)


Third step, price drops at Nordstrom Rack from $125 for a tee to $35 for bandwagoners.



Final blow, Costco for bargain hunters.


We had pretty much enough of Magic after 5 hours and moved on to the real reason for Vegas, PROJECT.

The Project show has become massive. A comprehensive array of all the top tier brands we work with, and others we'd love to introduce to the Sacramento area, Project is the work of Atrium NY founder Sam Ben-Avraham. XXXXL tall tees and Fruit Loops jeans are replaced with pima cotton wovens, chambray work shirts, japanese denim, and premium leather footwear.

Some of the standouts for us were Sperry's boutique specific collection, Vael Footwear, Evisu Denim, Quiksilver LTD, PF Flyers, Cr8tive Recreation, Ever, RetroSuperFuture and Mosley Tribes sunglasses, the Gentle Fawn collection, Nudie, WESC, Spindle and Cannister, and Scotch and Soda.

As I mentioned earlier, this is how men dress. Note the lack of hot pink, glitter, and faux tattoo graphics.



While most of the nation withers in retail purgatory (some have even made it to retail hell over the last 6 months), retailers and brands at Project seemed optimistic. Construction got better, fits became more refined, and amazingly (the one benefit of the global meltdown) prices came down almost across the board. We're seeing better fabrics and leathers offered at more reasonable pricepoints, putting better product more within the reach of our customer base. I can't tell you how stoked I was to find products like Vael's Brogue and shirting from Orthodox priced not too far above more mainstream footwear and apparel brands.

Wrapping up Project for the day I hustled over to GUILD at the Palms to track down Baxter of California, SeaVees, Reigning Champ, and pretty much my favorite thing ever, Warriors Of Radness. Trust me, you're gonna shit your pants when you see what this brand is delivering this Summer and Fall. Guild is held on the 34th and 35 floors, with each hotel room set up as a showroom for each brand.

Saw THIS guy.

Mark from Ludwig was holding it down at Guild.

Mark and the crew run one of the best agencies on the West Coast, and rep 2 of our favorite lines, Ludwig and Huffer. Wrote our biz with them at Class so we just chilled...

Also got Baxter of California coming in. People in the know seek this stuff out. It took a long time for us to get our account established, but never again will you have to use your girlfriend/wife/mom's skincare and shampoo. Other Baxter dealers: Barneys, Fred Segal, Legion LA, Frank's Chop Shop, and more. Good company to be in. Speaking of Frank's Chop Shop...

dropping in May.

I'm out of steam. Let's call this chapter 1. More to follow.