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The Secrets to Staying Relevant in Fashion · Inside Retail

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, good afternoon.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: I am Faye.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm the uh event director for Springfair and thank you for joining me today, Jeff.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I am joined today by Jeff Banks, who is a renowned fashion designer, and we're here to talk about your history and fashion.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh thank you for joining me on the Re Inside Retail podcast.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: Jeff, tell me about your career and your the evolution within fashion and what that's what that's been to you.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: How long have you gone?
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: As long as you talk.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: So what?
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Did you want the start or when I actually heard you earlier this year at the gift awards where you talked about how it all started, taking those suitcases on the road and going directly into retail and talking to them directly?
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: So do you want to just share how that changed over the years?
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: I actually I left um St.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Martin's Art School uh as a textile designer, um, and I couldn't get a job.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I was technically out of work.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I was actually quite a good illustrator, uh, uh, particularly buildings, um, because I'd done a course at an architectural school.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I started doing what they call three-dimensional illustration um in kind of white ink that you then spray with an air gun in different colours that makes it look like neon lighting.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: So I ended up working for Mecca dance halls, redesigning dance halls into bingo halls.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah?
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: Quite a big change then.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Big change from textile to that.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: But I was actually quite good at it.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and the guy who was the chairman of Mecca, a guy called Alan Fairley, kind of took a shine to me and was giving me loads of work.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought I need to train an assistant.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I was only about 21, 22.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought if I open a closed shop um somewhere, um, and Mary Quant had two shops at the time, um, and it was just big, swinging London was just beginning.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought if I open a shop, um, I can have three officers above to run my illustration business while the shop's ticking over downstairs.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: So a load of the people that I was at college with, like Ozzy Clark, Follen Tuffin, Moya Bowler, I I was friends with them, all we were all friends.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: So I got them to make the clothes for this shop.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it took about six months to kind of I found the shop, met another guy about the same age as me, and we went into business together to finance it.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and all these people made the stuff for the shop.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we had an opening on September the 6th, 1964.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how long ago it was.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like 62 years ago.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: And um, it was just amazing success straight away that um people like Terence Stamp, Gene Shrimpton, Glenda Jackson all came to the opening.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we sold out on the first day.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then had the problem, it'd taken six months to make the clothes, and then we were empty.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and luckily the following day, a lady who looked like Mary Poppins turned up at the shop and she'd read about it in the newspaper, um, and she was looking for a job closer to home, and she was Mary Quant's design room manager.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: And she'd worked for Hardy Amis, Norman Hartnell, Mary, um, an incredible woman.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I explained the problem.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: And at the back of the shop, it was an old bakery shop.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: There was this massive room, and we showed it to Frida, and she said, Oh, this would make a fantastic workroom.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: Can you draw?
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: So I said, Yeah, I can draw.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: She said, Anything you can draw, I can make.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: And within a week, we had our own cutting room, 12 machinists, Frida running it, and we were making our own clothes.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and literally stuff that I was drawing um turned into a bit of thing.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: Straight off the sewing machines into the shop, and we'd get a queue outside of five or six hundred people, and we would let them in 20 at a time, because the shop was very small, and blow a whistle after 20 minutes.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: And if people hadn't bought something, we'd throw them out.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: And it was like Can you imagine doing that today?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: It was the advent of fast retail.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: So that was really my beginning.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and Frida literally taught me everything I know how to sew, how to make a pattern, how to manufacture, really just everything.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: And she she was just the most amazing woman.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: And she she actually did the embroidery on Queen Elizabeth's wedding dress for Norman Hartnell.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and at the time later on, I married a fairly famous pop star, and I used to do all her stage clothes, and Frida would do all the embroidery on them, like you know, really that 1960s paillette embroidered thing.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: That was like Frida.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: Real, real so that's that's where I began in retail.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um and how did you grow the business from there?
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: How did you take well it just I eventually uh not after very long, in that was in September.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: By uh the March, we were already internationally famous because like London at the time was the epicentre of everything.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um and there was a guy called Paul Young.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, Paul owned the rights, the beef was for America, and he was opening a chain of shops in America, and he sent a young lady called Sandy Moss, who was an ex-New York model as his buyer to buy our collection for America.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: And we then went um in 65 to New York to promote the collection in New York and met a lady called Ida Shellino, who was the buyer for Bloomingdale's Young East Cider shop.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: And Ida fell in love with the collection and wanted to buy it for 56 Bloomingdale stores, which was a big deal.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, of course.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: And she placed an order, this is in 1965, for half a million dollars.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: Which was serious money.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: And in those days, you could go to the bank and get a loan, um, which was guaranteed for half of the money of the value of an order.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: So we managed to get an overdraft of a quarter of a million dollars to manufacture this order, and it went into America in Bloomingdales and just sold out within days.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's incredible.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: And then Ida, she said, this is much bigger than you can cope with.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you should then have a licensee manufacturer in America.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: So she introduced us to somebody called Arnold Freeman, who owned a company called Mindy Malone Dressers on 7th Avenue.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: And Arnold was a lovely guy, a big American cigar smoking rag trader.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we signed a license arrangement with him, and he had two other designers.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: One of them was a designer called Daniel Heschler, who's very famous in France, um, and a guy called Jean-Claude Castleberc and me.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so they were called Frenchie One and Frenchie Two, because he could never pronounce their name, and I was English.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um so we actually I ended up working two weeks every two months in New York and grew the business there.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: So that really introduced me to America.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: So you went international quite quickly within the year.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: Within a year.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: And it's it's mainly because it's difficult to imagine these days how much England, Britain was at the forefront.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you have to imagine that really all of the American was kind of like 1950s cocktail dresses, party dresses.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, in France and Italy, there was virtually no ready-to-wear.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, everything was still couture.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there was a bit of ready-to-wear in Germany, but not very much.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: In England, at that time, people just made the same thing every year.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: So if you were a coat manufacturer, you made the same coats and you just changed the colours.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, fashion was very dull.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: So at that point, um, everybody wanted a bit of England, so we just took off like a rocket.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: And how did you spark those trends?
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think how did you spark and ignite those trends?
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think you have been a trend setter and have a recognizable brand that other brands tried.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a question of trend.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: You actually did it.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: It was like, you know, everybody was copying us.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was like, and that really was just basic imagination.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: It was like um, it wasn't a question of there being.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I to this day I don't believe in trends.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I I just believe in doing what I think is right at any one time.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, you know, I don't even subscribe to a magazine anymore, so I never look at magazines.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I'm not really that bothered what somebody has done historically or is doing tomorrow yesterday.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm really more concerned about yeah that creative comes from within feeling is yeah, my sensitivity to something, and that's based on having to kind of constantly nervously reinvent yourself every day.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I kind of wake up in the middle of the night worrying, and it's like yeah, it's like, and I I always have done.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: And you have reinvented yourself and kind of every day kept evolving.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: How do you what's what takes the resilience to do that?
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: How do you how do you find that within self-anxiety?
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, yeah, it never goes away.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's like so I I mean that business I I sold my share in that business in '69.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and at the time in in France, ready to wear was just beginning, and there was a Frenchman called Jean Cacherel.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: And Jean created a range of the most beautiful shirts and women's trousers, and that was Cacherel.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: And there was nothing like it in England.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I set myself the task of being Britain's answer to Jean Cacherel.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it took me months and months and months to make the patterns to get the fit right, and actually started making um women's trousers in men's tailoring workshops, which sounds ludicrously simple, but it was very hard.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I eventually ended up making my trouser collection, Jeff Banks, in a Burberry factory in Yorkshire.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: And the Burberry Factory at the time made everything one at a time.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: So you had rows and rows of men at cutting tables cutting out a pair of trousers one at a time, not mass-producing, one at a time.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: So initially, my trousers were made in the Burberry factory one at a time, and they were immaculate.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: They were like, so very quickly I got Jeff Banks as a reputation for excellent tailoring.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for shirts and trousers.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then that was in 69, um, and I, with a guy called Ronnie Sterling, we started the British Fashion Council, and that didn't exist at that point.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and the reason we started it was that Paris had just gotten on to ready to wear, and they started an exhibition called the Preto Portair.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: And to get government funding to show at the Preto Porter, if you were a foundation, you could get government grant.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: So Ronnie and I started the British Fashion Council.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then we got the money to actually go to Paris and have the government pay for us.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how the British Fashion Council started.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: And still going today, right?
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Still going today, absolutely.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: And no helping someone.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: And they don't even send me an invite to their events anymore.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, yeah.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's a call out.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: Please invite Jeff.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's right.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: And is there a moment in your career that you're most proud of?
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um maybe several moments.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've been asked that before, and weirdly, one of the most amazing things I did was actually designing the Brownie and Girl Guide uniforms.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and you might think, you know, having done runway collections, I was British Designer of the Year twice, retailer of the year.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: But that one exercise, because there were 1.2 million members of the Brownies and Girl Guides, and the whole process, and the the Girl Guide movement, it's an amazing movement.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: The women's a brownie, it never made it to the girl guides, there was a brownie.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Princess Kate.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: She I've got a picture of her wearing my uniform.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_01: Oh wow.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: So she was a brownie, so it touched everybody.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: And the women that I worked with, a lady called Dr.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: June Patterson Brown.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: June was the most amazing woman.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: She was so powerful and strong, but incredibly genteel.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: She was just like an amazing personality, and she had round her this group of women that if ever you were going to go into the most difficult situation with, you'd want to be with these women.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know what I mean?
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: They were like they're amazing.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: Strength in them.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: So and Princess Margaret was the patron.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I had to design her uniform.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but that was an amazing experience.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's an iconic uniform, actually.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: It was, yeah, they've just changed it recently, um, which I don't I kind of would say that, wouldn't I?
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think it's not as good as yours.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's a bit condescending.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's evolved to something different.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's like so uh, yeah.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: So that probably is a benchmark.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, yeah.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: And for fashion designers or brands that are coming up in the world today, what would be your advice to them?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know?
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: I really would dread to start at the moment.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I mean, I I started Graduate Fashion Week 30 years ago, and that was to bring two and a half thousand graduates a year to London to show their collection so they could get a job.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's two and a half designers a year, two and a half thousand designers.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um there's no jobs for them.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: So it's really um a very difficult scenario now.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: So we're training all of these people.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, how do you actually begin in business?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the high street is desolate.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the kind of the big department stores are gone.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: So, what's the route into the market if you design something?
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Very difficult um to actually find uh a custom to work with.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: So, do you have to have the money to set up your own retail store?
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: Lots of people say, oh, online business is the way.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: Easier said than done to try and get above the hedge in online, yeah.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_00: Very difficult to get a following.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that can take you years to get into the numbers that make it a worthwhile business.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: So my advice is probably to look in yourself as to what is truly authentic that's real, because reality in this world of imagination is gonna count for a lot.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: Being authentic, yeah, and actually being genuine, and actually standing for something and a principle that's behind your design.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: And if you can do that, then you have something genuine to be able to go out and offer.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the foundations within the brand.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's yeah.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: So if you actually think of all of the great brands, you know, you know, whoever, whether it's Giorgio Armani, whether it's Burberry, whether it's Belstaff, Balfour, all of them have an original, authentic story at the beginning of it that is the crucial kind of crucible for that brand beginning.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that's vital.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: If you've got that, then you're in with a chance of actually making progress in retail.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but at the moment, I think it doesn't matter whether it's America, China, Australia, Europe, the retail market is very difficult.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's the hardest I've ever known it.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's it's it's tough to get into.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, of course.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I I think there is a huge amount of brands that will feel like they're challenged on a day-to-day basis, and it's about failing quick and learning fast and evolving with the kind of challenges that are thrown at them every single day, because we don't know what's round the corner, and um well, what what we do what we do know around the corner is I think um there is going to be a massive redress financially globally.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's around the corner, because it's already happening in here in Europe, it's happening in China.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I think people are becoming more and more sensitive as to how they spend what money they've got.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, they're becoming much more demanding for quality, longevity, and assurance.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think the retailers, much to their shame, are much more aggressive in their pricing and their demand on margin of profit.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: So I think the retailers are becoming very aggressive.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, 20 years ago, we all knew that you each always had to make a living between all layers.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of gone out the window now.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's like dog eat dog.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: So that makes it much harder.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but at the end of the day, the one consoling fact I have, we haven't, with AI, with advancement in everything, I haven't noticed a lot of naked people on the street.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: So that fashion is still working.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: That for me is the kind of shining light until everybody starts walking around naked.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: There's still a job for me to do.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: There's still something to be done.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: People should be dressed, thankfully.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: Oh dear, yeah, that's a thought.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and is there something that you are looking for in the halls today?
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: Is there any brands that you're looking out for?
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: Anyone you're hoping to meet?
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: No, I mean uh my reason for being at the exhibition is that I've uh a range of crockery and pottery that I'm actually selling here.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I enjoy doing that.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, I come to this exhibition because it's an opportunity for me retailers um that are actually buying my stuff and selling it and listening to their critique on what I'm doing.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's no good living in a bubble and actually not connecting with people.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then you bump into people that actually talk to you about your clothing, about your shoes, or about your shirt, or or somebody that bought something like 10 years ago and he still likes it, but it doesn't fit anymore.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: I thought bring it back.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so it's worthwhile in that respect.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, um, and what I find interesting at this exhibition um is it's full up with independence.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's independent companies and it's independent retailers, and that is a diminishing arena um because so much of what we do has been taken over by the multiples, you know, by the supermarkets, by the big traders, by the volume people.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's squeezing the independence out of existence.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: So to come and be amongst people that have still got the verve to have an independent shop in the middle of Derbyshire or in Ramsbottom in Lancashire or whatever.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's really refreshing.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: You actually think you go away thinking, oh, there's hope yet.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there is if only we can get the high street back to as I remember it.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: And there are places that you go to, you know, in Essex or in Lancashire or in Norfolk, where there's suddenly there's this beautiful little high street that is still functioning.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that gives you hope that there's like an opportunity.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think it's so important to revive the high street and it not be a lottery on where that is.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: It would love it to be across the UK.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you look, you know, when I started in business in Blackheath, it was a high street, you know, and I had a little shop,£11 a week rent, um, very low rates, local community, everybody knew one another.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: It was wonderful.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that's a distant memory.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, what we've now got is the supermarket, the power of supermarkets.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: We've got retail parks that are anchored by a supermarket, maybe a Tesco or Little or whatever.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you've actually got the big multiples, you know, the MSs and the next, that have all started trading out of town now.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Shopping malls that were previously anchored by the Debanums and the Frasers no longer have those anchors, but all of them offering free parking.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: And meanwhile, our high streets that are run by local councils, they like to put like a kind of uh a parking lot that's charging you six, seven pounds for two hours.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: If not more.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: If not more.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: And the worst bit is you stay an hour longer and then suddenly you've got a hundred pound fine.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so we need our local councils that are already earning from rates and all the rest of it to actually ease up to actually make the high street more attractive again, and then it's what can you do to the high street to actually make it work better?
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I did a project with a firm of architects about 15 years ago, and I worked with them on the principle of um the Eden project down in Corner of actually taking Stoke on Trent High Street and cover it in a glass bubble.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um that to me would have saved Stoke on Trent High Street.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: That we could have had indoor gardens, controlled atmosphere, old high street, with everything that was a high street environment, cafes, restaurants, shops, all in a bubble.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: Not beyond the wit of man, because when I looked at the Eden project, it's doable, architecturally it's feasible, and that would have actually made shopping malls out of high streets.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and there might still be a moment for that.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: We sparked it here, it could be something.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: I look further down the road, and I think in it's a future, it's a potential.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think everyone is really keen for the high streets locally and high streets to continue.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I think you've spoken about it on some national TV on our behalf.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: But we have um as spring and autumn fair and inside retail, we have launched our parking petition, which we are very much campaigning for for 90 minutes of free parking, which hopefully, with the backing of government and signatures behind it, we'll be able to see that come to fruition.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: What you've actually also got to do is get rid of like vape shops, get rid of like all these Turkish barbers.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Unfortunately, even like charity shops.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know that British Heart Foundation are closing 600 shops?
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: So even charity shops can't make the high street work at the moment.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: And actually, circular fashion is becoming such an important thing as well, right?
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: So and they're closing down, and we want to continue to champion that.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I I come to an exhibition like this and I'm in awe of the variety that's available here.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I look at as I walk around, I look at the the depth of product on every stand, and I find it amazing.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I just think, where the hell is it going to get sold?
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's just we do, we have uh hopefully through the doors over the next couple of days, we are aiming for over 20,000 retailers.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: So the hope is that this will be on the high street within our kind of stores going forward, and whether that's a multiple or a dependent, I think it's it will be there.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: How Jeff, how have you taken yourself and your name into that kind of licensed world and the products that you're also now doing outside of fashion?
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: So you've you've now got your name to some uh cookware, and what does that how have you have you found that transition?
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: I've railed it back in a bit.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: I had an Asian that worked for me, um, and he got me into the most incredible things, which at the time sounded great, but I regret.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, who wants to buy a Jeff Banks cooker?
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it was like it was like so.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: We stuck, we were doing stuff like that.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: Other things that we did, which were like wallpaper and paint and all that, those were great.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I'd do those again at the drop of a hat if I found the route into the market for it.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: So there are certain things that I think I know enough about to be good at, and that's the measure that if I think it's something um that I've got a skill in and I've got a temperature gauge for, and that I have a personal feeling for, then I can design it.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, if I don't have an empathy with it, then avoid it.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: So that's my yardstick.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: So people come to me, like I'm I'm just launching in January a range of men's and women's pajamas.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: Lovely.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: And they're not actually pajamas, it's more loungewear that if you get back from work and you just want to flop around on the sofa, watch the telly, have a glass of wine, what's the home outfit for that?
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: Hello.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: The Jeff Banks loungewear.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now, why?
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's because what I do.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's like I get home of an evening, all of this the tog, the uniform comes off, hang it up, put it away, wait for another day, and stick on something that's just easy to loll around on the sofa.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: So that's the inspiration for it.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: So um, yeah, I I have an empathy towards that, and hopefully, enough like-minded people will want to buy into it, but the quality has to be there, the price has got to be right, the route into the market's got to be all of these things, and then how do you promote it so that people know to go looking for it?
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: So you need a following to be able to do that, um, and not disgrace yourself, it's like yeah, very important.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: And are you doing that in association with the brand or are you doing yeah?
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there's a great company called the Blue Company.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they're my licensee.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I've designed it, they um are taking care of the manufacture of it, the marketing of it.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and they're a British company.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um fingers crossed, it's bringing it to market in January.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so for me, there's always an opportunity somewhere.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you you yeah, I call it going fishing.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: You actually need to like put the bait on the end of the fishing rod, flick it out into the lake and see what happens, and see if anything catches and then reel it in quickly.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I and I still enjoy doing that.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's great, and I think testament to you for sure.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I as licensing and licensed products is it's an automatic storytelling for a retailer within their store, and it's something we're really championing within spring and autumn first.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the reason I got into licensing um was that I owned a chain of shops, warehouse.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and when we started, we had about six shots, um, and all the manageresses used to love phoning up on a Sunday evening to tell me personally how much they had taken the previous week.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: So then we got to ten healthy competitions, yeah.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: So then 10 shots, great, ten a phone and other.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: Then we got to 70 shots, so Sunday night would start at six o'clock, and at midnight I'd get off the phone with all these manageresses, and it used to drive my wife nuts, you know.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: That like and then so when I sold that business, I thought I don't want to do that anymore.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, you know, so I then uh decided to go into licensing, so I didn't have the responsibility, which I've enjoyed in a way, but I regret in another way.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: I because I I like the um being hands-on.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: I like no, it's the cooperative spirit.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love the managers, I love the staff in the shops, I I love being a shopkeeper.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, I miss that bit of it.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_01: A community is so important.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's amazing to retail.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: The retail community, it's a sad thing about e-commerce.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's so special.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's just it's a lovely community, and it's like, and I bump into people here that used to work for me, they're now they've now got their own businesses or whatever, and just remembering the good old days, it's like it's fantastic.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: So and what what would be your love letter to retail?
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_01: What would be how would you kind of summarize it maybe in a sentence or two?
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um I guess it gave me life.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think you know, at the when I came out of college, I really didn't know what to do, couldn't get a job.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh my parents were, my dad was a sheet metal worker, my mother was a nurse.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I had no background in commerce, there was no family business for me to go in.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I was kind of like, you know, a kind of like a little baby turtle washed up on the beach.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and suddenly retail presented itself by accident, and then it's made a life for me.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's like all over the world in America, China, Australia, Japan.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um it gave me a life, and it's been a brilliant and wonderful experience.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's like magical.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's like being in the rock business, you know.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's like a musician.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: Probably if you spoke to Eric Clapton, you know, what would his answer to this question be?
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody gave him a guitar.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, changed his life.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: Me, somebody gave me a little shopping blackheath.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: Bingo.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: Here we are.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: At that, there's so much emotive energy within that, and I think it will mean a lot to a lot of people, and they will be able to relate to that.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_01: So thank you.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: Jeff, this is the final question for you today.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, one of our segments is buy or buy a purchase or say goodbye to something.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the item that we are going to say to you is a£500-pound designer suit that you've not tried on, you've purchased online.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: Would you buy it or would you say goodbye to it?
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, difficult question for me to answer because I make all my own clothes.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the, yeah, one of the things is never wear anybody else's.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um and the reason for that is that I can remember Sir Stuart Rose, now Lord Rose, when he was chief executive of Marks and Spencer, he was doing the AGM for MS, and somebody said to him, Stuart, what tie are you wearing?
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Oh, it's Air Maze.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: And he should have said MS.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_01: MLS.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: And the shares in Marks and Spencer's die the following morning.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: So for me, the answer would be if there was a£500 designer suit on sale, I would pass unless it had a Jeff Banks label in it.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jeff.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_01: Appreciate you joining us on the Inside Retail podcast.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: Enjoy the rest of your day.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks.