From 27th to 31st along Seventh Avenue, from the side streets between Sixth and Eighth Avenues, there was once a fabled concentration of real estate unlike anything else in the world. This was New York’s famous fur district, the epicenter of designing, cutting, dressing, processing, auctioning, and wholesaling. Canada, Scandinavia, and Russia each had its own market areas, but only New York ran a completely unique, self-contained industry with its own sound, energy, history, and personality. Adelaide’s lament (“Take back your mink, take back your ‘poils’”) worked so endearingly in Frank Loesser’s Guys and Dolls because it captured the tone and spirit of those Seventh Avenue streets.
Here, fur workers in long white coats, like wandering chemists, moved haltingly with hangers aloft holding rare jungle treasure. Shimmering raw skins swung rhythmically from rickety hand trucks. On the crowded streets, smooth retailers rubbed elbows with savvy merchants. Animated talk determined today’s style, tomorrow’s trend, future price. The chatter continued nonstop at Hershey’s Dairy Restaurant on West 29th or Trader’s Café at 30th and Seventh. For the uninitiated, it was like dropping in on a Borscht Belt conclave where the humor is ethnic and loud. The waiters added their own outrageous monologues.
“Forget the roast beef. Try the brisket.” “I’ll heat the rolls. I’ll get the soup!” “What do you mean, no spoons!” “Stop complaining already!” “Seeded rolls? Onion rolls?” “What’s the rush?” “Coming!” “Can’t you hear me, I’m coming.”
A returning regular from Florida would shout, “Take it easy. I haven’t had ptomaine poisoning in a month.”
There was classier dining at the Fur Club in the Hotel Pennsylvania with the same bouncing phone number Glenn Miller and his big band made famous in 1940— Pennsylvania six, five, oh, oh, oh. Or reserved dining at the aging, dowdy Governor Clinton Hotel.
When Gilbert Advertising became the agency for the Great Lakes Mink Association, an organization of two thousand mink ranchers at the end of the fifties, we became part of a thriving, international marketing environment.
Raw fur sales held at the Hudson’s Bay Company or the NY Auction Company attracted a worldwide audience of furriers, ranchers, retailers, and the foreign press. Only on Wall Street could you see more frenetic trading and buying. Bill Fitzgerald, NY’s noted auctioneer, combined lot numbers, bids and general jargon in an explosive, rapid-fire cadence that electrified the room.
All eyes and ears were laser locked on the competing personalities—a famous French couturier, a leading Italian retailer, a German fur broker, and an interloper from Japan whose sly, surreptitious movements kept upping the ante.
The fur bundle that usually charged the action was from John Adkins of Coalville, Utah—Great Lakes’ renowned rancher, producer of the Black Willow label. Mink is natural brown in color, and a near-black pelt is a rare achievement in mink breeding. In 1964, John Adkins set a New York record of $150 a skin and, years later, a world record of $1,200. Since it can take up to seventy skins to produce a coat, the magnitude of the bid becomes clear. (Lesser-priced bundles are selectively chosen to go with the top lots to keep the product marketable).
Ranch mink is exactly what it implies—mink bred, raised, and cultivated under carefully supervised farm conditions. Wild mink, captured in traps and facing extinction, is a totally different genus.
The natural ranch mink coat is a work of art. Each pelt is surgically cut into narrow, diagonal strips, known as letting out, and then skillfully sewn together. This allows for design flexibility, a lighter, more comfortable weight than skin-on-skin, a supple flow of fur and a special iridescence of color. Watch a beautiful mink coat catch the light and you can see the science of its breeding and crafting.
Today, deep, dark Great Lakes Mink is the top fashion fur, but Great Lakes wasn’t always the top bundle.
When Gilbert Advertising took over the account, EMBA (Mutation Mink Breeders Association), producers of naturally colored mink, was the furry choice. It included autumn haze (light brown), cerulean (blue), lunaraine (brown), jasmine (white), and azurene (blue gray). Great Lakes natural dark mink was just another competing shade. To me, black was always an emblem of elegance, be it a long, shapely, satin gown, a black pearl, a Mercedes, Jaguar, or Rolls. I believed that dark, almost-black ranch mink could have a similar cachet. I recommended an institutional campaign to sell the inherent dusky beauty rather than promoting specific designs by Revillon, Maximilian, Ben Kahn, Fredrica, and Christie Brothers, the industry leaders. Dark mink was closest to sable, the rarest and most luxurious of furs. I said Great Lakes Mink could be the American sable. I also thought its initials could be reduced to a perfect selling complement. Glamour—GLMA.
In one typical message, we built an immediate visual identity. The ad was headlined, “The world’s most glamorous brunette: GLMA, born and bred in America.” Here, a near-black monk’s hood design framed the polished face of a sleek blonde in an attempt to win attention through contradiction. We ran the theme internationally in leading British, French, German, Italian, and Spanish fashion magazines. In France, we tied in with Henri Chombert, a prestigious Parisian furrier who numbered Elizabeth Taylor among his clientele. We changed models, revised the headlines and featured Miss Taylor: “The world’s most glamorous brunette meets the world’s most glamorous brunette.” The ad was a precursor for all the legendary Blackglama celebrity advertising that followed.
We were fortunate to have Dave Loffman, Great Lakes marketing director, as an ally. Unbeknownst to us, Dave always wanted to highlight the black character of mink and was envious of the Black Diamond label that was registered by a leading Seventh Avenue manufacturer.
There was much to like about Dave. He joined an out-of-school faculty that showed me other worlds, other disciplines. He was a tough, self-taught graduate of the Lower East Side, a middleweight amateur boxer who left the gym to take odd jobs in fur market workshops. He had that same “don’t push me” toughness I’d seen earlier in Meyer Horowitz of the Village Barn.
Dave cut pelts, nailed skins, sewed fur, learned how to grade mink, and then assisted in showrooms. During the bloody trade union days of the thirties, he carried a gun and rode in the cabs of trucks to challenge any labor hoodlums brought in to intimidate the industry. He had a narrow, ski slope nose and, though a boxer, took pride that it had never been broken. He proved a careful, thoughtful spokesman, and somehow acquired an off-key English accent. His cultural interests were always a surprise. He loved opera, had a keen knowledge of Charles Dickens, and was an early fan of William Styron. Dave was well trusted and respected throughout the fur trade, which made him an effective marketing and advertising director.
Dave and I went to Milwaukee’s Pfister Hotel to present the ads and new strategy to the Great Lakes Board of Directors. I met John Adkins of Coalville, Utah; Ed Leischow of Kenosha, Wisconsin; Alvin Jensen of Oklee, Minnesota; Charles Ide of Donner’s Grove, Illinois; Dale Anderson of Mitchell, South Dakota; and Don Gothier of Anthon, Iowa. These were some of the finest fur ranchers in the world, and most were from places I’d never heard of. I thought of Trader’s and Hershey’s with their boisterous, immigrant mélange of Jews, Greeks, and Russians and the contrasting, heartland America, Norman Rockwell identity of these ranchers.
Great Lakes also brought a new consideration of business responsibility. Unlike other assignments, farm, family, and financial security were all tied to the success of the marketing plan. Ed Leischow, secretary of the Board, said, “Richard, if you believe this is the best way to sell dark ranch mink, then we should go along.” My usually steadfast confidence was shaken just a bit by that open trust. We all live with lurking insecurities. I reread the business plan, reviewed the suggested themes, took a fresh look at the entire program, took a deep breath, and marched forward.
Despite the growing competition from imports, the critical considerations of ecology in the sixties, the rising popularity of fake fur, and the always-fickle nature of the marketplace, our institutional concentration on shade and quality rather than specific style helped turn dark mink into the cynosure of high fashion. Prestige retailers and designers were quick to tie in with the natural Great Lakes product, as aggressive opportunists and copiers at the time were flooding stores with inferior quality mink that had been dyed black.
One of our ads countered with, “She does. Her Great Lakes mink doesn’t,” a subtle spoof of Clairol’s “Does she or doesn’t she” hair-coloring campaign. We stressed the “born dark” natural quality of GLMA. Another ad, with a model in a bare, off-the-shoulder pose, offered, “Straight from the shoulder advice to a woman in love with her natural black GLMA mink.”
There were many trips to meet with directors or address the general membership, and I became more and more involved with the ranchers. My Christmas card file was a subscriber’s list to the Farmer’s Almanac. Wives and children attended meetings and, at times, it was a county fair. I became an unofficial rancher, a member of the Great Lakes family. It was clear we all shared the same concerns when we were crowded around TV sets in the Pfister Hotel listening to President Kennedy on October 22, 1962. He spoke soberly about the Cuban missile crisis, the Soviet ships off our coast, and the terrifying threat of nuclear war. He called for character and courage to meet the fearful challenge. “Our goal is not the victory of might, but the vindication of right, etc.” but I could only think, “How am I going to get home?” If disaster struck, I just wanted to be in my own bed. Fortunately for all, Kennedy and Khruschchev were able to effect a face-saving compromise. JFK’s fateful “abyss of destruction” had been avoided in perhaps his finest hour.
Just thirteen months to the day later, I was recalling that experience with Dave while we had an early lunch following a morning auction. After lunch I walked toward Macy’s, enjoying one of those refreshingly cloudless, Indian summer spells. The streets were busy, coats had come off, and spirits were high. Friday afternoons do anticipate weekend play and freedom. I wanted to keep walking but when a cab discharged a passenger in front of me, I jumped in. We had only gone a short distance when the cabbie turned suddenly and shouted something I didn’t understand. I did the second time.
“The president’s been shot! The president’s been shot! Did you hear that?” He switched stations and another announcement said, “That’s all we have for now. We will keep you informed.”
I told him to speed to the agency. There, the staff was listening silently, nervously to office radios. There were sobs, embraces, tears, but few words.
Shortly after two o’clock, the brief, overwhelming statement, “The president of the United States is dead. I repeat, it has just been announced that the president of the United States is dead.”
“Oh, no!” someone shouted.
I embraced Mary Johnson, my long-term personal secretary, called home, and closed the agency.
We all died a little with the loss of the president, particularly this young, unfulfilled one. Assassinations are for history books, not personal experience. The reality is just too painful. That blast from a high-powered rifle in downtown Dallas took something precious from all of us. I saw it in the red-rimmed eyes and frightened faces of those I passed on the street. I soon found myself at the northern end of the United Nations. I climbed the steps, crossed the broad quadrangle, and stared at the river. The tide kept tapping the embankment in orderly sequence. There were no other sounds. I welcomed the stillness.
In my mind, I saw Jack and Jackie Kennedy at Hyannis Port and all those incredibly happy family pictures. I thought of the Cuban missile crisis and the unyielding words of leadership. I saw Jack and Jackie entertaining at the White House and began to understand why England reveres its king and queen. The handsome, young Kennedys had an air of royalty and their style and manner seemed to elevate us all. And what pride we felt following JFK’s summer’s trip to Europe when he received one of the largest and most emotional receptions ever accorded an American president.
I picked up a small stone. I just wanted to have something of that day. I kept staring at the river.
“The pressures of life are not always distributed by choice. Who says life has to be fair?”
John F. Kennedy said that.
There were ten mostly happy years with Great Lakes and it was difficult to think of ending our relationship. At the agency, we made a decision to cut back on selective high fashion because it limited the pursuit of more broadly distributed consumer brands. The continuing personal involvement with Great Lakes was another problem. Dave was like a proud father and always wanted me at his side when there were marketing difficulties or selling opportunities. He sometimes made me feel as if I worked for Great Lakes alone, and I just couldn’t afford the time. The budget was also limited. I mentioned this to Dave on a number of occasions but he just shrugged his shoulders and ignored me.
One day, we met at his regular table at Trader’s. He anticipated the discussion. Down deep, he knew and understood my goals. I told him I thought it was time we both accepted that a new agency might bring a fresh, new perspective. I said I’d stay until a replacement was found, even assist in the evaluation and appointment. (One of those I recommended for the account was Jane Trahey, a champion ad lady, who later used the term ‘Blackglama’ with the accompanying slogan, “What becomes a legend most?” Her ads highlighted a Who’s Who of personalities and stars.)
Dave had a patented handshake, similar to a Phi Beta Kappa grip, and this time the grip was just a little firmer. “There’ll always be room at the table,” he said. “I expect you to stay close and let us know how you’re doing. Remember, a recommendation, even from a little furrier, can be helpful.”
Not one of my easier moments.