I might be in deep shit.

It seems that a famous politcal figure that I have previously parodied might be coming to the store to shop.

I am in deep shit.

I'm as busy as a one legged man in an ass kicking contest.

Hey, I am out at a client today on my weekly visit to the city, so I won’t be doing a lot of posting until tonight.

I will however accept questions. Especially planted questions because they are the best kind.

I spent a couple of hours weeding the backyard yesterday because we are going to host a brunch for the family after my granddaughters first Holy Communion. The wife insisted I hire a gardener but the guys I called all needed weeks notice to fit me in. Even illegal immigrants schedule their jobs on their I-phones these days. WTF?

Anyways I just blew through it like I usually did. We used to plant a lot in the backyard when the wife worked at the restaurant as we had big blowout barbeques every weekend. They were great because a lot of the guests were waitresses and bartenders and bar backs and they pitched right in to clean up when everything was done. Now it’s all up to Grandpa.

Tomorrow I will be working on some of the food. You know salads that will stay until Sunday. Potato Salad. A macaroni salad with basil, ricotta salada and cherry tomatoes and stuff like that.

Plus shopping for the party. And the wife is on a panel discussion for the plus size industry in a big event on Friday. So your humble correspondent will be busting his ass trying to get everything done.

I wish Laura Bush, Kelly Clarkson, Hazel, Fiver and Bigwig were able to lend a hand. Lazy bastards..

And your little dog too!

Well it has been an extremely busy week here at the store. Which is great but exhausting. We made a lot of sales but had a lot of extra cirruclar activity going on.

We had the show "Closet Cases" film on Wednesday. It was about a five hour shoot and it was pretty exhasuting for everyone involved. There were about twelve people in the crew and the logistics were tough. I didn't do like I usually do for "What Not to Wear" and I just served pastries and coffee. But I think the shoot went very well and they will have a great episode. It is supposed to be a special called "Fashion at any age" with women who are in their twenties, thirties and forties. We had the woman in her forties and she found some great stuff. So I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Anyway before all this happened three dudes come in who say they are stylists for a movie and want to pull some clothes. Which is fine as far as it goes because we have new policies that make it worth our while. But there was a problem. One of them had one of those little yapping frou-frou dogs in a carrier. We have a strict policy at Lee Lee's. No dogs.

Now me personally I love dogs. I mean real dogs. Big sloppy dogs that jump up with their muddy paws and get you all dirty. Dogs that have a kerchief tied around their neck and run around catching a Frisbee. Dogs that run with you in the park or swim with you in the ocean. That stick their big doggie heads out the window and let their tongues hang out as you are speeding down the highway.

But we have a big problem with dogs. You see many of the hipster doufous assholes who have moved into the neighborhood have these tiny frou-frou dogs instead of kids. And they think they can take the dogs anywhere they want to go. I mean they go "Oh don't worry I will pick him up." Yeah that works. You have him in one hand then you get tied and move him to the other hand. Meantime you touch a silk dress with the dog hair smeared hand. Plus how are you going to try something on if you are holding a dog.

The first week we were open someone walked in with a frou-frou dog on a leash. Before we could say anything the dog took a leak right on the floor. The woman looked at us. Didn't say anything. Picked up the dog and ran out of the store. So we had a policy from then on, No dogs No exceptions.

Now if you want to tie your dog up outside I will be happy to stand outside and watch him for you. Which you have to do in this neighborhood because officious nosy bastards will stop and go in a self important voice "Whose dog is this, they shouldn't leave it tied up outside." To which I would reply " Well it ain't your dog asshole so why don't you just move on down along the highway allright." These people would never have stopped if it was a kid tied up to the parking meter.

Anyway back to the story at hand. So one of the guys has this dog in a fancy leather crate. I tell sorry dude no dogs. He starts going on and on. "I don't understand. I bring this do everywhere like this. Saks, Bloomingdale's, on the airplane...blah..blah...blah...I don't understand." "Dude it is easy to understand. No dogs means no dogs. It's simple. No dogs." His buddies tell him to wait outside and he does muttering away all the while. They came to get clothes and it was business. I am sure if they could get them somewhere else they would tell me to go fuck myself. But it wasn't personal. All I had to do is let this jemoke in with a dog and have one of my regular customers pass by and see it and they would bust my balls unmercifully and I might even lose customers. That's why a fucking rule is a rule. No dogs dude.

Anyway they are picking up the stuff today and lets hope it works out.

But no dogs dude.

What's up with you?

Man we have been really busy the last few days. What's funny is that we had no business since it was a beautiful Memorial Day weekend and I guess everyone went out to the beach or the mountains or whatever.

So we spent all day Memorial Day cleaning the store. We rearranged all the racks and cleaned the entire store from top to bottom. Now I have someone come in to clean four times a week but we never have a chance to check out all the nooks and crannies to see what was going on. When we did it was dust everywhere so we cleaned like monkeys. If monkeys clean that is. So no time to post a lot.

But all the pocket books got cleaned. That counts for something.

Oh why the meatballs and spaghetti? I don't know, I guess I am just hungry.

Hey you can't please everybody.

So yesterday one of our best customers comes in to get some new spring stuff. But as she was leaving she mentions that she left a great review of our store on Yelp. She said that she had read some nasty stuff and had to rebut it because it was so unfair.

Well the wife went right to the site and was really pissed. I mean there was the post from one of our rivals who posted bullshit about us which I told Yelp about but they left it up because I wouldn't give in to their pressure tactics and advertise with them. But there was a new post that pissed her off.

This woman said that she bought a bra that she liked but complained about the service. She said she got too much service. Now when you come in for a bra fitting the wife makes sure you get the right one. I mean she did a video about it.So of course it is going to be in your face or I guess your bresses if you know what I mean. But then this woman did a second post where she said she came back and was "pressured" into getting another bra. What the fuck.

As the wife said when she read it "Get a pair of balls." If you don't want something you don't have to buy it. Do you know how many times she gives a fitting, works really hard and then the person decides not to buy anything. It happens all the time. Nobody can force you to buy something if you don't want it. And then to go on a review site and complain about it. The wife called it getting beer muscles. I told her it happens on the Internet all the time. People say shit they don't have the balls to say in real life. What can you do.

Anyway we looked this twat up in the computer and she came twice. In two years. Each time she bought one thing. A bra. And she was a 34 C which is just about the smallest bra we carry. What the fuck. GO TO MACY"S YOU STUPID BITCH!

Anyway I had to deal with the fall out of that. And the wife is on the look out to see if she comes back.

I pity the fool.

Hey the new line starts over here!

We are taking in a new line of clothing from a California manufacturer called Melissa Massie. She actually came to the store to show us her stuff and among other stuff we ordered the three dresses you see here. Now this can give you some idea of the problems we have when purchasing goods. You have to be able to visualize how these clothes will fit on a body and moreover on a plus size body. Not always an easy thing to do. Now the wife and couple of girls tried on some of her stuff to see what it looked like but not all of the samples they had were in the right size so a lot of guesswork is involved. That is what gives us a major amount of stress. There are a million decisions that go into putting together a season. How many dresses? How many tops? How many pants? What accessories should we get to go with this line? It is the farthest thing from an exact science as you can get. You have to go with your gut and if you are right three times out of five you are doing great.

We will be at the Fame, ENK and Moda shows on Monday and Tuesday and it will be more gut wrenching decisions one after another. But hey that's what you sign on for when you start a business so that's just the way it is.

It's Saturday Morning and I am behind the counter again!

Hey it's Saturday morning and I am back behind the counter and using the wife's computer so you will have to endure more fashion blogging this morning.
This is our "paint brush" Melissa dress which seems to be very popular. It is in our classic Melissa body but with a kind of wild fabric with a lot of black and grey and blue and pink all splashed together. Somehow it does seem to work out and a lot of the girls are loving it as a work dress. We only cut 30 of them and half are gone after two weeks so it is already a success. We will put it on the Internet today and that should take care of the rest.

A lot of people think having an online business is a panacea but let me tell you it is a pain in the balls. You get returns and the garments are often not in great shape. If you suspect they were worn and then returned you get in a beef with the customer. I talk to a lot of other retailers and tell a lot of horror stories. I have been pretty lucky but the fuck-ups have been spectacular.

One sale we did over the phone. The person who called up begged and pleaded that we send out a coat over night because she wanted to wear it for her birthday so we did. But what we didn't know was that she used her grandmothers card without her permission. So when the grand ma refused the charges the credit card company refunded it to her and we were out the money. There was no insurance because it didn't go through the normal e-commerce site and we lost out big time even though we had a signed UPS slip where the grand daughter accepted the package. I tried to pursue it through the cops as a fraud case but they didn't give a shit. So we made a new rule, no two new rules.
Never take a phone order unless we have a signed credit card receipt. And never send anything to Newark, New Jersey.

Another sale was to this woman in Georgia. She called up and said that the UPS driver had left the dress on her porch and it had got soaked. She asked what she should do. I said to hang it up to dry and then try it on before she sent it back because she had to decided if she wanted to buy it before I send her a new one.
So of course she didn't want it and sent it back. But then we got in a hassle because she wanted to be refunded for the postage to mail it back. Now I think it would fair for me to pay for it if she wanted a new dress but if she just is returning it I shouldn't have to pay for postage since I don't pay for that on a normal return. I mean I can't pay for everyone to try on our clothes. If you order something and don't like it that's the chance you take if you don't want to order from a mega-retailer like QVC. I ain't QVC, I am just a little shop in Brooklyn. Anyway we went back and forth with emails and such and it is just a big pain in the ass. Not worth the time and trouble.

So don't think Internet sales are the be all and end all. It is a good revenue stream but you can't count on it unless you are LL Bean or something like that.

Rock'Em Sock'Em sales today in Lee Lee's!

Man we were so freaking busy today it was crazy. Rock'Em Sock'Em sales from when I opened the door at 10 this morning. We were in the store till one in the morning yesterday pricing stuff and writing Lee Lee's blog and stuff. So I let her sleep in. But it as in the 80's today and a bunch of people decided they didn't have anything to wear and wanted to shop. So we just worked like maniacs straight through. I was alone for the first two hours and it was touch and go for a while. It all worked out but I am bushed.

Hey frenchie fuck you!

So a couple of weeks ago this french comes with his stuff to the store and tries to market a bunch of stuff to the wife. Of course he comes on a Friday when we are super busy. We had a very busy Friday but when I am in the store I can handle all the phone calls and vendors and inquiries and talk to people while she is styling someone and can concentrate on selling. Anyway this dude has really never done plus which is a whole different world than the straight sizes. He swears he can do it but they almost never do. I have a new policy that we only put in a minimal order with a new vendor because I want to see the fit and the difference between the sample and the final production pieces because sometimes they can be wildly different. Because of the fucking tax season I wasn't around so I wasn't able to put the kibosh on some of the stuff but the order was small enough that I didn't care. Anyway this guy calls up and was extremely rude to my sales girl when we weren't there to take his call. I emailed him to tell him to take a chill pill. I mean we didn't seek him out, he is trying to sell to us so he should realize that and not be an arrogant french asshole. I mean I really hate the French. I don't want to buy from them. His shit wasn't that special anyway. Did I mention I really hate the French. I mean I don't even get French's mustard on my hot dog it's Guldens all the way. So he writes me this incoherent email where he says he cancel my order because nobody ever talked back to him like that before. Did I mention I hate the French. He wasn't used to plain spoken Brooklyn Guido speak. I am really happy he cancelled. I mean I don't even really like French Fries.

Did I mention I hate the French.

You can never get it right.

So Easter Monday some scum bags tagged the side of the store again. Now the last time I changed the angle of my outside camera and sure enough I have the whole thing on tape. In fact the douche bag who did it walked right in front of the camera and stood and almost posed. There were three of them. One walked down the President street and another down Court St. Then the main asshole tagged the wall. He stops to admire it and then walks back towards the camera and stands there talking to the other douche.

Anyway the last time this happened the cops were right on it. The lieutenant who was in charge came to the store and told me to make a complaint through 311 and let them know about it. They came and took a police report. Now I didn't have the camera properly positioned and I couldn't figure out how the machine I had then worked. So I got a new dvr and have everything on tape. I call 311 four days ago and no one has shown up yet. I called the same lieutenant four times in the last four days and have not heard a word. I called the community affairs officer who I met at the Court St Merchants and not a word. I guess they are having a fucking sale at Duckin' Donuts. Last time I had the cops but no evidence. Now I have lots of evidence and no cops.

I am going to try to figure out to post the video to the Internet to see if anybody can id this douche bag. He was a white hipster doufus. You know the kind of shit head the neighborhood guys call a "liberal." He thinks that tagging a building with graffiti is cool. Rebellious. Artistic.

I am going to put out a contract on him.

So long and thanks for the cheese.

So yesterday my wife gets a call in the store. One of our customers is a writer and went to a conference in Italy before her next book tour. You know a promotional exercise. She was calling us from JFK airport because it seems that the airline had lost her luggage. So she had no idea of when her stuff would be returned to her. Now we had started this practice of cutting a very limited number of dresses, no more than 20 in a particular fabric. We would show a sample and the girls could pre buy it. Now the reason why that is important is that we only cut so many of a specific size. Let's say 3 size one and 3 size two. So if you don't get your size you are out of luck because there are no more. We had cut this green dress that looked really great. We basically sold 15 out of 20 before it even got to the store and this girl got one of them. She told us that she got a million compliments on the dress and it was her absolute favorite and if it was lost she had to replace it no matter what. Luckily one of the two we have left was her size and we put it on the side for her. She came right from the airport to buy it. That's when we heard the rest of the story.

You see on her way back from Italy she decided to smuggle in a huge wheel of Parmesan cheese that she put in her luggage. Fragrant Parmesan. So now that her luggage is sitting on the hot tarmac somewhere all of her wardrobe for her bookstore is going to sell like happy hour at the Olive Garden. So she is waiting a couple of days but she thinks she will have to replace a lot of stuff fast. She will be back on Friday. All I could think of to say is, "So long and thanks for the cheese."

Problems of a shop keeper.

This weeks problem is storage. We are starting to bring in spring and have a bunch of winter stuff we have to store. Now some stores do crazy sales to get inventory clearance but we feel we don't need to do that. A lot of our stuff is classic and will sell just fine next fall. Especially stuff like coats and sweaters. We sold a ton of stuff this year from last years lines at a reduced price but without giving it away. You have to have confidence that you will be around for a while.

So I have to find a way to save some inventory where it won't get damaged.

A lot of the stuff will be just great for spring and will sell through three seasons. Like the dress in the photo which I call the "Erte" dress. My wife is a big fan of the artist Erte and we have several of his pieces of art in the house. I tell women when they try on this dress they should be wearing a kerchief, smoking a cigarette in a cigarette holder and standing next to a very skinny dog. It is art deco all the way. This is the first dress that my wife had a hand in designing and has been a great seller for us. It is in a beefy Italian fabric that has substance to it and it smooths out the back when it fits properly. There is also extra fabric as it is a wrap dress which sometimes have a tendency to open up and look sloppy. We have more fabric in certain spots to avoid that as well as to manipulate the decolletage so it can be appropriate for work or play. I have sold three of them today so far. Perfect for spring when is still a little chilly.

Problems of a shopkeeper

So I have this girl who works for us from day one. She is a good worker who doesn't complain. Her story was that when we opened the shop we would give her one day every other week because she wanted some extra money. She worked in an insurance company but had experience because she had worked at Macy's during holiday time. So for the first year she worked and eventually started doing doing two days a week as we got busy. Then she got laid off from her job and I gave her more hours while she was looking for another full time gig. Now this was before the shit hit the fan in the economy. Still and all when she applied for jobs there were about 1,000 other people applying as well. So I told her I would give her all the hours I could. She didn't want to accept a full time gig because she still was sending out resumes and trying to get a job in insurance. But it wasn't working out and when my last full time employee didn't work out I offered her the full time gig and she accepted.

So you ask what's the problem. Well the deal is that she likes to have a cocktail or two. We actually knew her from when we were running a bar in Midtown and we know she loves the Irish bar culture. Just like me. Most of her friends are bartenders or waitresses and she hangs out with them all the time. So party time is coming up as it's St. Patrick's Day and it is always wild. Now when you are friends with the bar staff and are a regular at a joint you never pay on Paddy's day because they make so much money from the tourists and the once a year assholes. So you just drink and party and when the day is over the staff gets even more wasted the next day to blow off steam. So we gave her off on Wednesday since she would be useless. It would be ridiculous to expect her to be coherent and it is no big deal. But you see she went out last night and is already an hour late today. I am all alone in the shop just as I was last Saturday morning since the wife doesn't come in early as she opens the rest of the week and has to be "on" when she is here on Saturday. She has to mentally prepare. So I need help early on a Saturday Morning if I have a bra fitting or something or a girl who is weirded out by a straight guy helping her buy clothes. That doesn't happen all the time but is not unusual.

My dilemma is that a lot of you parents must have. How can I bust on her for behavior that I always indulged in. I mean I was never late for work. I always showed up although I will admit occasionally I was useless until I had about ten cups of coffee, two egg sandwiches and a good dump. So I have been there. I would feel like a major league hypocrite busting her when it was par for the course for me for thirty years. Now the wife is relatively a teetotaler compared to your Trooper and her attitude is different. I have to find a middle ground here where I can explain that she has to be serious about her job since jobs are not easy to come by in this economy. But also realizing that people are people and they fuck up occasionally. You have to be human you know.

Oh wait I have a bra fitting.

It's a crime I tell ya!!!

I am so busy it is a freakin' crime. We had to go to a vendor yesterday to buy fall and I was out all day and couldn't get to my accounting bullshit until around 10 at night. So it was a long night and I had no time to post. I hope to fix that soon. I mean I didn't review the Idol when it was freakin' Michael Jackson night. That had to be a hot mess.

I hope to have some good shit up tonight. No not that kind of good shit Titus. The other kind.

The problems of a shopkeeper

I promised I would talk about the two recurring problems that we face in the store. The first is the customer who monopolizes your attention and the dressing room and then doesn’t buy anything. That is pretty bad. But it is not the worst. You know what the worst thing is?

The Gay Husband.

We seem to have a lot of girls who come in who are married to gay guys and they don’t even know it. Or they know it but they don’t want to acknowledge it. I don’t pay much attention to it because I don’t really care but the girls in the store know right away. I mean the tip off is that the guy is so opinionated and bitchy about the clothes. Since we have bigger sizes these mook’s are trashing their wives like Chris Brown before the Grammy’s. Verbally to be sure but still it sucks. “Well you would fit in that if you ate a few less bagels.” “You look like a grandmother in that dress.” “What’s the matter with you don’t you have a sense of style.”

Now most of the time when a guy comes in with his wife I will engage him in conversation to keep him from getting bored. Most guys don’t care that much about what the wife buys except for the price. The smart ones are happy if the wife is happy. Some of them bitch about the prices which is fine. They don’t have to buy it if they don’t want to. Times are tough and I understand that. I can usually find something to talk about. Sports, the movies, TV, the neighborhood, restaurants, or food. But if the guy is only interested in trashing his wife and making her feel like shit I can’t deal with that too well. I have to split so I don’t split the guys head open. One guy made his wife cry. So it can get real unpleasant. I let my wife handle it. She takes the girl into the dressing room and tells her to come back another time without her husband if she wants. We have much the same problem with abusive skinny moms and nasty skinny friends. They don’t want to be there and everything is negative. There is not much you can do then. You just have to let them live in their own life.

Anyway one of the gay husbands came in today with his wife. I was alone at the time so I just let them stew. She tried on a dress, he mocked her, her lip quivered and they left. Par for the course.

I wonder how Katie does it.

It must be easier when you are rich.

Problems of a shopkeeper

This morning I had two of the recurring problems of a shopkeeper. You see my wife sleeps in on Saturday morning because she is there opening all week long. I open up and usually have a girl in the store to help me out. I mean I can sell the clothes with no problem but there are certain things I can’t do, like bra fittings. And sometimes a new customer might be shy and not want to come out of the dressing room to discuss the fit with a guy.

But to compensate for that I have my Saturday morning regulars who always come in after they go to the gym or go shopping. If I am not there, they ask for me. When you pay as close attention as we do to the customer’s we have a pretty good idea what your gig is.

So here’s one of the problem. There is this woman who works two doors down at the insurance office. She is about a size 14 which means we have tons of cute stuff that she looks great in. And we are having a 50% off sale and there are some great dresses that are about $60 or so. Great for work. But the problem with this nut job is that she never buys anything. Ever. She has been in the store about 30 or 40 times and has tried on tons of clothes and never buys anything. So what do you do? I mean she might buy something. But she didn’t again. Do you ask her to leave? Can’t do that. Do you ask her why she comes in and doesn’t ever buy anything? I mean my wife could do that but not me. She can talk to her on a woman to woman basis and find out what the story is and what is really going on. I mean the customer is always right. But if you never buy anything are you a customer? Trying on clothes puts wear and tear on them. All of our clothes are in pristine condition. After someone tries something on we often steam them to refresh them. Do I need to go to that effort for someone who never ever buys anything?

They don’t give you a store owner’s guide for these situations. I have to just calm down and use common sense. I can’t go with my natural first instinct. Which is to beat her to death with a shovel and feed her to Mr. Wu’s pigs. You just have to be professional without letting her take the real expensive garments into the dressing room. It is still a work in progress.

The thing is the shovel is handy because it snowed this week.

Sorry I was busy!

I am busy for a couple of days and all hell breaks loose! We had a rough show the last few days as we hit three shows: Curve, Courtelle, and Moda. We found some great new companies and had it out with some of old suppliers. You will be hearing about our big problems with Tadashi in the next few weeks. All in all it was a good couple of days. We found a great new handbag supplier so we can give our old one the heave ho after some crap he pulled. We also found a very interesting sleep and lounge wear company that might be great. And we found a really nice California dress company that will fit right in. It was exhausting but rewarding.

Back to the old routine tomorrow.

Hey we found a new vendor

So we just came back from Curve the lingerie show and found a few new vendors. We found a great new sleep wear vendor who has interest silk lounge wear and a new vendor for panties. But as we were sitting in the sock guys booth I noticed a bra hanging in a booth across the aisle. It was big. Very big. Fuckin' big. So after we put our sock order in we went over to check it out.
It seems that they have bra's up to a size 48K which is basically as big as your head, if you had one of those Easter Island heads. We are getting a few in the store for the ladies who have the really big bazooms.

I thought all of you guys interested in retail would be interested in all the details.

Or at least the pictures.

It's Saturday Night so you know what time it is?

Well it's Saturday night and we have had a very busy day as sales have been brisk and we have been on the go since I opened this morning. So I went to Joe's Superette and picked up four dozen prosciutto balls and a few bottles of Manhattan Special.

Because as Titus always says, Saturday night is the best time to pop a couple of balls in your mouth.

A good week and I hope a good weekend.

Well we had a very good week for February, which was mostly a function of my wife and I both being in the store. We have been working towards getting unique pieces in small runs, 30 to 40 dresses in fabrics that no one else will have. Many of the major vendors have dropped their plus lines and are stopping production at around size 12 or so. Thus there will be a big demand for dresses that the major department stores won't meet because they didn't order any new product.

Plus one of our major competitors went out of business this week. They opened in Soho and were paying an enormous rent as well as another big store out on the island. You never want to see someone go out of business but there is a lesson there, don't try to grow too big too fast.

A famous TV personality came to the store to shop for his best girl friend from high school. He always helps her pick out stuff when she has an occasion. He said "I knew I had to come here. You make it so easy. I will always find something perfect." That was very satisfying to hear for my wife. With all the ups and downs, positive feedback is always great.

It has long been my contention that everybody does one thing well. I always put it in sports terms that drives my wife crazy. But I tell her if you have Charles Oakley on your team and he always gets 15 rebounds and ten points you can run your team based on that number. You just can't assume that he will get 20 rebounds and 20 points just because you want him to do so. You have to only count on what he does well, not some pie in the sky. Every company usually has one dress that is superb. The fit is right, the fabric is outstanding and the look is really really right. One of these dresses is the Bubble Dress pictured above. It is the perfect dress for a night out on the town. You can dress it up with fancy jewerly or dress it down with tights and boots. And they cut it with sleeves for the winter. I sold a ton of these dress and just got in a new shipment which might be the last plus that this company will cut for the year. I might sell five of them this weekend as the bubble dress with sleeves is a very popular party dress.

This dress just flys out of the store. It should be great.