After 60 years, the tie association hangs it up
By Ray A. Smith
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
June 4, 2008
Many American men stopped wearing neckties years ago. Now, even tie guys are giving up on them.
After 60 years, the Men's Dress Furnishings Association, the trade group that represents American tie makers, is expected to shut down today.
Association members number just 25, down from 120 during the 1980s power-tie era. U.S. tie companies have been consolidating. Others have closed because of overseas competition as the U.S. market share for American-made ties has fallen to about 40 percent, from 75 percent in 1995.
The biggest reason for the group's demise is that men aren't wearing ties.
According to a recent Gallup Poll, the number of men who wore ties every day to work last year dropped to a record low of 6 percent, down from 10 percent in 2002. U.S. sales have dropped to $677.7 million in the 12 months ending March 31, from their peak of $1.3 billion in 1995, according to market researcher NPD Group. Although sales are expected to get a bump around Father's Day, June 15, the future of neckties is very much in doubt.
Some members of the neckwear association sensed the trend two years ago when, at the group's annual luncheon in New York, a number of people turned up tieless. Marty Staff, CEO of men's clothing company JA Apparel Corp., which has a big neckwear business, was one of them.
''It was deliberate,'' explained Staff, who said he wanted to make a statement to his colleagues. ''Historically, the guy wearing the navy suit, the white shirt and the burgundy tie would be the CEO. Now he's the accountant.
''Power is being able to dress the way you want." Although the company he directs owns the Joseph Abboud label, and he enjoys ties, ''I just don't like when [a tie] becomes obligatory.''
He is not alone.
A new generation of menswear manufacturers and fashion designers has grown up seeing ties as optional. Although they design and produce ties, many are ambivalent about wearing them.
The problem for neckwear designers, as for regular guys, is that a tie no longer automatically conveys the authority and respectability it once did, even if it does cause some people to call you sir.
In fact, it can be a symbol of subservience and of trying too hard.
Scott Sternberg, 33, who founded the Band of Outsiders tie label in 2004, has quickly developed a following of young hipsters who buy his skinny ties. He said younger men find wearing ties more interesting today when they are ''outside of obligation.''
Stalwart defenders have emerged to carry the flag. Phillips-Van Heusen Corp., the New York apparel giant that will produce 25 million ties this year, is so committed to preserving the tie's stature that it requires its employees to wear one to work every day, even on casual Fridays, when men can wear jeans.
Lee Terrill, an executive member of the tie trade association, is optimistic about the tie's future and believes the economic downturn is actually good for business. His reasoning is that laid-off workers will need new ties for job interviews.
Gerald Andersen, the tie association's executive director, stresses that dissolving the trade organization doesn't mean that ties are dead.
Bankers, lawyers and accountants still wear them. Celebrities still wear them to red-carpet events.
Originally Posted by Minnow
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