"Black Kids Don't Read" Last Words Before Retail Graveyard
Word Count: 864
Author: Claude Johnson
"Black Kids Don't Read" Last Words Before Retail Graveyard
Certain principles of life and business never change. Like
with the law of gravity, for example, its just plain better
to know how it works even if you’re not sure why.
I was reminded of this last week when the men’s
fashion clothing trade magazine Daily News Record (DNR) ran
a story (”Retail Graveyard,” October 29) about
a guy named Peter Divietro in Sloatsburg, N.Y., who
annually for Halloween decorates his front yard with
tombstones to commemorate dead retail stores.
That in turn reminded me of a failed chain of hip-hop
clothing stores in Chicago called The Lark. Do you remember
The Lark?
The owner was Lenny Rothschild. I met him on a sales visit
at his suburban Chicago office one summer day in 2003 while
my company was still making Black Fives throwback jerseys
for wholesale distribution to stores. The Lark was an
important account because it commanded the urban fashion
retail market in Chicago.
“FLYING HIGH; WITH AN UPSCALE APPROACH TO
MERCHANDISING AND CUSTOMER SERVICE, THE LARK SOARS IN
CHICAGO’S URBAN MARKET,” read a headline in DNR
earlier that year. “As Lenny Rothschild pilots his
silver Mercedes-Benz coupe around Chicago, his love for the
city is obvious,” is how that article began (DNR,
February 10, 2003).
If you wanted your goods in Chicago, you had to sell Lenny.
All the biggest streetwear brands loved him, and Lenny was
the gatekeeper who could make or break small, upcoming
apparel brands like Black Fives. And he knew it.
Lenny was smart, and he wanted people to know it. His
Harvard diploma hung prominently on the wall. Lenny
delighted in explaining how to introduce new merchandise to
coincide with welfare check and tax refund arrival dates,
to maximize sales to his most faithful customer base,
low-income inner-city residents. His stores were
concentrated in those areas.
I showed and pitched my unique, attractive, high-quality,
economically priced jerseys and matching fitted hats. Lenny
looked them over and shrugged, and asked me how I expected
anyone to know about the history of these Black Fives teams
and players. I showed him some big press clippings and also
explained that each jersey comes with its own informative
hang tag, reminiscent of a collectible vintage basketball
card, with images on one side and history text on the
other. I handed him one of the cards.
“This won’t matter because black kids
don’t read,” said Lenny.
Today, when I think of the immutable principles that work
in life and in business, I think of two of them that
applied to Lenny that day. One is that how you do anything
is how you do everything. The other is that what you focus
on expands. The trick is that these principles work the
same whether in the negative or in the positive realm.
Lenny gave me an $8,000 order that afternoon. I shipped it,
but what he didn’t realize is that his
“loyal” customers had already begun a quiet
revolt. Instead of buying $300 retro jerseys like the kind
The Lark was selling, his clientele had flipped the script,
now buying plain white tee shirts to make the same fashion
statement at three for $10. It was the revenge of the lowly
urban consumer. It happened across the country. It was
swift and it was bloody. Many urban retailers didn’t
make it.
Within two weeks, Lenny returned his Black Fives order
unopened.
Whenever I shopped at The Lark, customer service
didn’t exist. Young African American employees were
distant and resentful, usually the sign of low wages, cheap
thinking, and lack of appreciation by management.
Not to pick on Lenny, because he wasn’t alone in this
approach to the so-called “loyal inner-city
consumer,” but didn’t you have that experience
too, nearly everywhere you shopped?
By 2005, The Lark lay buried in the retail graveyard.
“AFTER THE LARK: ‘MORE HIP, NO HOP’;
CLOSING HIS HIP-HOP APPAREL CHAIN, RETAILER OPENS ESSEX5,
DEVOTED TO PREMIUM DENIM, SPORTSWEAR,” read the DNR
headline this time. “The Lark is grounded,” the
article began. “Lenny Rothschild has closed all 10 of
The Lark stores he owned and operated, making the
once-high-flying hip-hop apparel specialty chain a thing of
the past” (DNR, December 19, 2005).
What I’ll always remember about The Lark are Lenny
Rothschild’s famous (last) words: “black kids
don’t read.”
The principles of life and business always work the same.
Beliefs do become reality. Thoughts lead to feelings lead
to actions lead to results. This works both ways, in this
case to the advantage of the consumer and to the dismay of
the retailer. Lenny could’ve avoided it all if there
had been any books like T. Harv Eker’s brilliant
Secrets of the Millionaire Mind available for him to read
at the time. But there weren’t. And he didn’t.
Thus, the Lark’s tombstone might have the epitaph,
“Gee, I guess black kids read after all.”
Was Lenny right? Or do all kids read less? Or is it only
online reading they do? Or something else? What’s
your opinion?
About the Author:
Claude Johnson runs Greenwich, Ct.-based Black Fives, Inc.
(http://www.blackfives.com), which combines insights about
the pre-NBA history of African American basketball teams
with popular elements of contemporary black culture to
motivate, enlighten, and inspire people today. Licensing
pacts with Nike and Converse propel the brand globally.
