West Coast Collective: Looking for a Few Good Menswear Retailers
The three-year-old menswear show West Coast Collective has been on a mission to create an exclusive, upscale menswear show on the West Coast that provides a smaller, more personal alternative to the massive MAGIC International trade show.
“We’re finding more and more retailers and exhibitors are shying away from MAGIC,” said Stevi Goetz, one of the show’s organizers and the West Coast rep for Forte Cashmere and C. Joseph.
Goetz said MAGIC has “too much going” and many retailers say they like the “intimacy” of the West Coast Collective show, which is held bi-annually at the W Hotel in Westwood, Calif.
Even so, many of the lines represented are also regular MAGIC exhibitors. But designer Louis Alvear, who exhibits his line at both the West Coast Collective and MAGIC, said exhibiting at the West Coast Collective gives him a chance to show his line of leather outerwear to retailers in a more relaxed environment.
“I get to spend time with the buyers in a friendly place rather than MAGIC,” he said.
The show has grown from 30 original exhibitors showing about 150 lines on two hotel floors to 70 exhibitors showing approximately 300 lines on four floors. The show has been held at the W Hotel since its beginning, when the hotel was the Westwood Marquis.
Goetz is one of four organizers of the show. Larry Hymes, West Coast representative for Long Beach, Calif.-based Louis Alvear Inc., Hyela Sablosky, New York-based rep for Jhane Barnes, and Herb Goetz, a West Coast rep for Marco Trani Italian Knits, are also founders of the show.
The Feb. 4–6 run of the show drew retailers from smaller, better menswear specialty stores in California, Washington, Oregon, Montana, Nevada, Arizona and Hawaii, as well as larger specialty retailers such as Nordstrom, according to Stevi Goetz.
Alvear said he has noticed more European retailers shopping the show in recent years.
“Retailers could do just about everything here,” Sablosky said.
Indeed, the menswear lines on display range from Calvin Klein sportswear and furnishings to Tommy Bahama sportswear and Lloyds Cuff Links.
“It is a local show but it’s supported by all the major companies back East,” Stevi Goetz said.
The West Coast Collective also includes Southern California manufacturers Luis Alvear outerwear, BCBG menswear, BC Ethic, Jefri Jeans and Retrospettiva.
Organizers said they schedule the show to fall between the designer collections in New York and the MAGIC show in Las Vegas. The next run of the show is scheduled for August.
“People can get a lot of work done before MAGIC,” said Hymes.
For more information, on the show, contact Stevi Goetz at (213) 620-1700.
