TRADE SHOWS
Pooltradeshow Attracts Creative Companies
Matt Fellows is an artist who takes his sketches and transfers them onto blank T-shirts, which wholesale for $16. He started his MNKR Brand label in Los Angeles 15 years ago and has been a regular at the Pooltradeshow ever since.
The recent August show was his 22nd event, where he displayed his counterculture T-shirts, which carried messages such as “Touch Nature,” showing a hand holding a bunch of pine trees, or “Hit the Road Jack,” with a drawing of a Volkswagen van traveling through a Monument Valley–like scene.
“This show is really fun and worthwhile,” said the curly-haired Fellows. “And there is no other art-driven show where we fit in.”
He said he always exhibits in the same location so his customers can find him. He gets buyers from small mom-and-pop stores to larger chains including Urban Outfitters and Right-on, a Japanese retail chain.
The artsy vibe of the trade show was the perfect place for Alice Grau, the creative director for Global Mamas, a label that works with African women who make hand-dyed batik garments, recycled glass-bead jewelry, handbags and shea-butter lotion and soap. All the clothing is made from organic cotton, which comes from a GOTS-certified supplier in India.
This was Grau’s third time at the show, where she has been gradually reaching out to U.S. customers to build upon the brand’s business in Australia and Europe. “Because we are new to this show, it has been a slow build of customers,” she said. “But this show has been decent enough.”
Rex Tegelaar has been coming to the Pooltradeshow for so long he remembers when it was an upstart, independent event centered around a hotel pool. For years, he has been showing his Cali Good Life by Rex T-shirts, but this time he was introducing his latest creation, the Beverly Hills Surf Club label, which wholesales T-shirts for $15 and sweatshirt hoodies for $35 to $38. “This show is an easy show to do. It gets a good mix of people. There are a lot of Japanese buyers who come to the show, although I don’t see a lot of Europeans,” he said.
He said he was seeing mostly boutique owners looking for something new and different.
