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Brad Gartman on Flag and Anthem (Audio) · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Now on Bloomberg Radio, we take stock of small business.
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  Speaker 1: Small businesses want more streamlining and less red. Take small
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  Speaker 1: business and then accept the no, but maybe kill them.
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  Speaker 1: There's so many people that have ideas and it has
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  Speaker 1: to be more than that. It has to be making
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  Speaker 1: it real. Bloomberg taking stock small Business in focus on
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  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. Listen up, all you potential male fashion easts.
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  Speaker 1: You know, maybe you don't want to wear the same
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  Speaker 1: uniform as everyone else, but you don't want to look
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  Speaker 1: like you're trying so hard you push fashion. The fashion
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  Speaker 1: envelope right off the table will enter Flag an Anthem, subtle, smart,
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  Speaker 1: well made style for the kind of guy who values
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  Speaker 1: hard work but also knows how to unwind and have
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  Speaker 1: a good time. And I think, as even I've just
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  Speaker 1: met him, that sounds very much like the co founder
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  Speaker 1: and CEO of Flag of Anthem, Brad Gartman, who's joining
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  Speaker 1: us now in our New York studio. Welcome, Thank you.
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  Speaker 1: So First of all, what is Flag and Anthem? You
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  Speaker 1: have a long career in fashion, will get to that,
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  Speaker 1: But what exactly is Flagg and Anthem? Um? We just
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  Speaker 1: I started this brand last last summer with my partner Zadmohi.
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  Speaker 1: He and I've been together for several years and we
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  Speaker 1: just saw a massive void that we believe in the marketplace. UM.
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  Speaker 1: We believe that on a on a ball, on a
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  Speaker 1: broad scale, there's a lot of teen retailers out there
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  Speaker 1: in the marketplace, and then there's a lot of more
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  Speaker 1: conventional UH brands that have been around for a long time,
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  Speaker 1: a very a lot of very traditional brands. And we
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  Speaker 1: feel for a twenty five thirty five year old guy
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  Speaker 1: who's just the average guy who's entering into the workforce, UM,
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  Speaker 1: he wants a digestible price point, he wants high quality,
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  Speaker 1: he wants a fit that he can UH, that he
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  Speaker 1: can understand. We just don't feel like there's been anything
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  Speaker 1: introduced in a very long time, UM that's gonna really
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  Speaker 1: cater to the everyday guy in this country and really
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  Speaker 1: internationally over the long term. Brad speaks, he speak to
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  Speaker 1: the issue of price points because I mean a fifty
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  Speaker 1: dollar hoodie for example, or a fifty dollar shirt, things
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  Speaker 1: like that, there must be a less a lot of
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  Speaker 1: competition out there for that shopper. What distinct wishes the
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  Speaker 1: quality of the product and also the delivery, the experience
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  Speaker 1: in the brand. That's a good question because there are
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  Speaker 1: there is a tremendous amount of competition out there. We
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  Speaker 1: feel that there's a lot of commodity type product out
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  Speaker 1: there that you can go get at any price point
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  Speaker 1: in the marketplace, but we also feel that there's a
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  Speaker 1: lot of UM. When you want to go get a
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  Speaker 1: really high quality product with a with our taste level
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  Speaker 1: and a lot of design detail, everything has some limitation
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  Speaker 1: to it, whether it's so what we're looking to do
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  Speaker 1: is provide that hundred and fifty dollars shirt that you
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  Speaker 1: would get from some premium brand with a very comparable
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  Speaker 1: or better quality UM, but we're going to provide it
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  Speaker 1: for fifty on a shirt forty nine, which you know
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  Speaker 1: it's it's always limited by fit, it's limited by being overdesigned.
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  Speaker 1: There's always some limitation from our advantage point in terms
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  Speaker 1: of what you see in the more premium brands out there.
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  Speaker 1: So we want something that can really get out there
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  Speaker 1: into the marketplace and in a very broad way and
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  Speaker 1: something that America will understand. So, um, you like Bruce
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  Speaker 1: Springsteen from New Jersey, how did you get from New
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  Speaker 1: Jersey see down by the Shore to Macy's and where
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  Speaker 1: you are now again. You have a kind of a
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  Speaker 1: long and substantial career in the fashion industry. Sure, as
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  Speaker 1: I mentioned, my partner and I are in this together
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  Speaker 1: where UM. You know, we're tied at the Hippie's actually
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  Speaker 1: in in Tokyo and traveling overseas and I'll be leading
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  Speaker 1: UH this weekend. But we started as business majors in
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  Speaker 1: college and we had, you know, a very financial driven background,
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  Speaker 1: but we wanted to do something more tangible, so we
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  Speaker 1: started out in training program, got a very solid foundation
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  Speaker 1: of buying UM. We started Lord and Taylor Believe it
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  Speaker 1: or Not UM, which was a tremendous foundation to our
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  Speaker 1: to our careers and buying UM. In product development, we
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  Speaker 1: did spend most of our careers at Macy's UM, where
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  Speaker 1: we really had just an amazing experience and got the
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  Speaker 1: entire life cycle foundation of everything with all of the sourcing,
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  Speaker 1: all of the overseas production, building brands that we were
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  Speaker 1: able to build from scratch into a hundred million dollar
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  Speaker 1: plus entities UM and really build some really things that
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  Speaker 1: we're very proud of over time. You also have the
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  Speaker 1: photographer and artistic director Nigel Barker, who is a participant
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  Speaker 1: as a judge and a photographer on America's Next Top
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  Speaker 1: Model and is the host of the reality show The Face.
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  Speaker 1: How key is that to the success of a brand
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  Speaker 1: spend and market spend and market well. Nigel's involvement has
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  Speaker 1: been just a real fortune for us because we've always
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  Speaker 1: had a UH focus on product and being able to
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  Speaker 1: sell product. Nigel really elevates just the entire cache of
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  Speaker 1: our brand his involvement. What he's been able to provide
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  Speaker 1: is a multitude of things. First is just his taste
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  Speaker 1: level and creative element in our design input, UM, he's
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  Speaker 1: his just his photography UH abilities, and having his involvement
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  Speaker 1: in a lot of our creative assets and our campaigns
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  Speaker 1: as we go forward is I can't think of anybody
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  Speaker 1: better that we would ever want to UM have as
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  Speaker 1: our advocate. UM. A couple of other things that that
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  Speaker 1: Nigel will be doing UH is in the marketplace, really
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  Speaker 1: being our advocate and a brand ambassador. So he's been
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  Speaker 1: just a real real UM. It's been very fortunate to
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  Speaker 1: have him out in the media where you know, wearing
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  Speaker 1: our product, having his network of advocates because they all
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  Speaker 1: share a tremendous taste level and very UM very aligned
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  Speaker 1: with where we want to go as a brand. So
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  Speaker 1: final question, what's what's your what's your dream, what's your vision?
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  Speaker 1: Where can we see flag an anthem now? And where
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  Speaker 1: is it gonna take you? Where you gonna take the company? Sure,
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  Speaker 1: we just have we have very broad, very big aspirations
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  Speaker 1: for the brand. So we've been very fortunate to get
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  Speaker 1: a lot of big retailers really out of the gate,
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  Speaker 1: which isn't your conventional startup brand. Uh. So we've got
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  Speaker 1: a diversified approach of retailers. We've got subscription based UM retailers,
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  Speaker 1: we've got online retailers, we've got brick and mortar retailers
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  Speaker 1: both specialty, and we're in like the Ron Robinson's the
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  Speaker 1: War Cash Cash a retailers of the world UM into
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  Speaker 1: the Stitch Fix which is more of a subscription model
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  Speaker 1: Buckle Dillard. So we've gotten a nice broad base to
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  Speaker 1: start out UM. But where we want to go is
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  Speaker 1: we we have much bigger plans. We we foresee this
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  Speaker 1: can extend into other categories, accessories, more dress, women's, other
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  Speaker 1: categories of business. We all feel can really elevate and
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  Speaker 1: take this brand to another level. We've got to leave
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  Speaker 1: it there, but I want to thank you very much.
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  Speaker 1: Brad Gartman is the co founder and the chief executive
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  Speaker 1: of Flag and Anthem. This is Bloomberg.