— By Kevin Montgomery (@kevinmonty) |
Betabrand, Valencia's latest—and probably not last—purveyor of $225 smoking jackets, hosted their opening party last night. This morning, the critics branded it “retarded” and a “scam.”
They also found a piece of chalk for some less weather-proof statements:
Comments (63)
Any idea which suburbs the vandals are from?
99% odds the spraypainter was Elle Ko.
Make that 100%: http://twitter.com/elleko/status/331870873868959744
Omg! What is homegirls problem?! Who is she?
Another 18 year old who has the whole world figured out, apparently.
late 20s / early 30s, actually.
Sister short bus needs some hugs.
LOOKIN AT YOU OAKLAND…
Us Oaklanders could care less about a store in SF.
Serious question. When/who/how did the term Yuppy come into existence?
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=yuppie
yuppie - young urban professional in the us
DINKs - dual income no kids in england
yup is from the 20’s.. became yuppies in the 80’s… a reference that kids were hipppies but now have real jobs and are now yups + hippies so you get yuppies.. aka the 2 worst things in the world
Don’t forget about the Yippies!
Fuck this place. I walked past yesterday and at their “party” they were playing Smashmouth or some shit. Clueless fucking people grasping at money.
Who are you to be so judgmental and self righteous? I’ve been to Betabrand before, and the people there are genuine. Their whole mission is to create a community and a creative platform for ideas. Everything is designed at made in San Francisco, supporting local businesses and domestic fabric mills.
Ted, what brand of clothing do you wear? I can’t understand why you would take the time to write such an aggressive post, and why people like you carry so much negative energy. For fuck’s sake…
hister.
Their whole mission is to create a financial profit for themselves.
Opening an expensive retail shop in a $30,000 per month space is not an act of generosity and charity for the community. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing, but you should probably take your lame business speak about “creative platforms and ideas” and shove it up your skill set.
“Creative platform for ideas.” Yeah, maybe it was the owner of the company dishing the company mission… However, my friend designed a sick sweatshirt, submitted it to Betabrand, and they made it. All locally. So yeah, Betabrand may not be saving the world, but for a clothing company, I think they’re doin it right.
what’s wrong with Smashmouth bro?
smashmouth or some shit. it either was or it wasnt. the fact that you don’t know shows how clueless you are
Doctor Memory-
Sounds like you might be on to something. Twitter appears to agree with you. Care to elaborate?
She was the one responsible for vandalizing the Levi’s pop-up a couple of years back: http://uptownalmanac.com/2010/07/levis-workshops-receiving-favorable-loc…
I’m friendly acquaintances with her and follow her twitter feed on and off, so the “retards” in the graffiti rung a bell. Not really much to tell beyond that.
BTW, I doubt that the chalk on the sidewalk was her. Not her style at all.
The hate is misguided. These are literally college kids trying to run a business from the ground up. Not freaking Jack Spade moving in.
And by college, i meant recent college grads.
College grads that are apparently not smart enough to realize that they are setting up shop in the the wrong neighborhood, or even the wrong city.
Really? I live in the neighborhood and welcome them. I’d rather have a local company trying to make it than some chain. Do you really expect every storefront in SF to house a soup kitchen or a social services agency? What is it you want, exactly?
Concur.
Yeah, god knows the Mission has never welcomed high-end retail. Oh wait…
Save us from people who’s idea of ‘history’ stretches back all the way to… the 80s.
Though it was a huge commercial district it was not high- end retail. It was a firmly working and middle class diversion district. Who’s gonna save us from condescending pricks like you?
I’d say they are more than just college kids. 30k a month for rent. Most grads seem to start out in a more reasonable space. I admit I don’t know much a out them but still …
“College kids” with tens of millions of dollars in working capital, tens of millions of dollars in venture capital, and the resources to rent a $30K / month retail space.
I guess these college kids had a different college kid experience than I did.
Disclaimer: I’m not intimately familiar with their financial workings, but I can do basic math.
tens of millions of dollars?
Correction: you *may* be able to do basic math, but your still stupid.
Call the math police and arrest him. Then you’re grammar police
Love it when people can’t use basic 4th-grade contractions while calling someone stupid.
Looks like I was wrong; they’ve only raised $8.02 million in actual venture capital:
http://www.crunchbase.com/company/betabrand
Their working capital is a rough guess based on case-studies for similar retail businesses in hyper expensive locations.
Impressive! They’re obviously very ambitious…. and they’ve convinced investors to help them become a larger, more successful business.
Can someone remind me why we are opposed to that vision?
Little short term memory loss in play??
Excessive greed, 2008 , Lehman Brothers collapse Bear Sterns AIG , Global financial melt down, the great recession. The world economy still has not recovered.
So, because there was a financial catastrophe in 2008, largely involving a specific set of unwise financial instruments, *all* investment and lending is now suspect? No money anywhere but mattresses! That should help the economy recover!
Ok, I remember: A group of people starting a local apparel company, getting investors, and moving on to Valencia often leads to global financial meltdowns.
The point was that excesses of finance caused the financial turmoil and great recession, and $300 smoking jackets and $80 socks are excessive. Still, in my dreams Valencia St is the place of creative class leader where ideas can change the world.
Why are you making stuff up? Socks on their site are $11, not $80, and they come with “Sock Insurance”, where they’ll replace a lost one. The smoking jackets, which look as complex to make as a suit jacket, are $225.
When you manufacture locally (in SF) and pay fair wages (two issues that progressives champion), clothing is more expensive. You can’t have Walmart prices without paying people pennies per month in firetraps in Bangladesh. Is anything more than that “excessive”?
We’re not.
We’re just negating settle down’s assertion that these are simple college kids building a small business from the ground up.
They are starting from the ground up. They’ve been around for a number of years and just graduated into this space. They started in 2005. I don’t like everything they make and I shouldn’t have to. They started a successful small business and have done well enough to gain some investors to help them grow. Based on their track record, I’d say that their plan is to grow in SF. They’re from SF, they’re designing and manufacturing everything in SF, they’re creating jobs in SF (non tech jobs, btw, for those that care), so what’s the problem?
definitely a productive way to counter supply and demand…
Wow. I hope she gets investigated and pays for her self-entitled vandalism
She’s currently on probation for grand larceny (shoplifting from Burberry and then passing the coats out to homeless people), so if Betabrand care to press the issue I imagine it will go poorly for her.
I think she’s trying to commit public suicide-by-legal-system, and kinda wish she’d stop.
Cowardice by the misinformed. Sadly, if you read her tweets, it’s clear she’s mentally ill.
KEEP PRESSIN ON BETABRAND. WE’RE GLAD YOU’RE IN SF!!
Yeah, she’s pretty clearly nutso.
This vandalism is lame. Betabrand is a legitimate business. I know one of the co-founders. He is a really cool guy and a long time San Franciscan. Yeah so they market to rich yuppies and I can’t afford their clothes, but SF is known for it’s yuppies and that is their target niche market. Let the yuppies wear their clothes and stop hating on good, honest people who simply happen to have good business sense. Jeez. This vandalism is particularly immature and idiotic. So obviously a case of reverse elitism and general hooliganist bullshit. Whoever did this, please stop, as we live in a place called society. You are a worser blight on the fair cityscape than the yuppies.
reverse elitism?
Oh my heavens! I hope all the rich people will be ok!
You know, I didn’t give two shits about Betabrand until this whole thing. Now I want to come out and support them. Great work, Ella!
I’m going to assume it’s those asshole anarchists that live across from the 16th street BART.
I have nothing against people making money off rich yuppies and techies, I just wish these stores and restaurants were in a different area so that their customers would go somewhere else.
My biggest problem with Betabrand is that they use the German et-set as their “B”, but it’s actually a double-S in German, so they’re sign is pronounced “Ssetabrand.” Anarchy.
+1
try again: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta
I stand corrected.
So it oughta be pronounced “Beta-eta-brand”. Still annoying. What’s wrong with the letter B?
I think arguing tautology is a losing battle. You might as well try to convince people not to say “ATM Machine” or “PIN Number”
It’s actually a Beta, the 2nd letter of the Greek alphabet. Wikipedia disambiguates:
“S Sharp” redirects here. It is not to be confused with its capital form, ẞ, the Latin letter B, or the Greek letter β (beta).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9F
Why are people always hatin’ on retards. Retards have feelings too.
I was impressed by how quickly and completely they cleaned up the graffiti vandalism on the photo montage .
I”m still wait and see , but they made a good introduction to show they care the neighbors.