Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 31, 1993 TAG: 9301300051
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Sandra Brown Kelly
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SOMEBODY OWES HILLARY A BIG THANKS
So what about Hillary Clinton's hat?Who cares? you say. You didn't like it anyway. Thought it was the wrong style, tilted too far forward or just plain silly looking.
But, after a run of bare-headed first ladies (except for Nancy Reagan's unobstrusive headgear), an inaugural hat ought to be some sort of economic indicator.
Bernard Grossman, an owner of America's largest hat company, Betmar Inc. in New York, said he has heard over the years that hat sales are stronger when the economy is weaker.
"But, in my heart, I can't follow that correlation," said Grossman.
The hat business has been growing moderately for the past 10 or 15 years, making a comeback from the days of beehive hairdos and barefoot flower children.
Sales already had picked up tempo pre-inauguration, but have gotten even better since Clinton's display.
Grossman said Washington retailers told him their millinery counters were clean a few days after the first lady wore her $200 chapeau to the swearing-in.
Betmar ships between 4,000 and 5,000 hats a day and business is up 15 percent in the last year, the owner said.
Hat sales are driven by fashion and utility - warmth for winter, shade for summer. But it's mostly fashion that tips the decision to buy a hat.
Grossman said demand "bulges" have been inspired by a wide range of females in hats, from a "buxom" actress on "Dallas" to Britain's Lady Di.
Hat sales totaled $658 million in 1990, the latest figures available from the American Apparel Manufacturers Association. This was up 9 percent from $604 million in 1987.
Women's hats account for most of the sales. The men's hat business hasn't been the same since John Kennedy took his oath bare-headed. The results were similar to what happened to undershirts when Clark Gable bared his chest in "It Happened One Night."
But even if Clinton in a hat is not a reliable barometer of the economy, it has more meaning than a covered head.
Casey Bush's theory is that young women are largely responsible for the higher hat business. Middle-aged women avoid hats because they don't want to stand out in a crowd, but young women want to be noticed.
"They don't want to be part of the woodwork," said Bush, who runs the Millinery Information Bureau in New York.
Ginger Equi, hat buyer for Leggett department stores in Roanoke, agrees that a woman in a hat could look like a fashion rebel in most gatherings.
But, a funny thing is happening, said Equi. "We're selling hats to everybody, but I don't know where they're wearing them. I don't even see many women in hats at church."
Equi's glad for the sales, however, and she's expecting them to continue upward.
"Hats are very trendy," she said.
Trendy is important.
Americans worry about how they are viewed. Remember when Pat Nixon shunned her fur for a cloth coat at Richard Nixon's inauguration so she would look more populist.
And the woman's club look of Hillary Clinton's hat might have been intended to reassure uneasy patriarchs that she was going to take her place as a good helpmate.
"In the world of politics, you have to go along to get along," said Grossman.
Darcy Creech, who designed Clinton's hat, is best known for her hats decorated with with paper flowers. Among the hats she sent Clinton was a black velour accented with parchment roses and blackberries.
"The hat [she chose] is conservative, and I think Hillary is conservative," said Creech. "What the hat projected to people was confidence and strength, and that's what she wanted to project."
The Southport, Conn., designer said Hillary Clinton's "values as far as women are concerned are in the right place."
Perhaps an even more important message was that by choosing a hat she liked rather than one fashion experts might have thought suited her more, Clinton was saying women are to be judged on "intelligence, not on fashion," said Creech.
Sandra Brown Kelly covers retailing and consumer-related issues for the Roanoke Times & World-News.