Year after year, Hamilton produces some of the best American made shrits around and 2012 looks to be no different.
Editor's Note:
After reading a few of the comments on this post, I decided to ask David Hamilton about
the pricing of their shirts. Here is his response:
Our mission is to provide the world’s finest shirt at every price point we offer. In other words, nobody is offering a better shirt at a lower price.
We use the world’s finest raw materials. I see lots of shirts that retail for prices below our raw materials cost. All of the shirts are sewn and hand cut in our Houston workshop. All employees earn a living wage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_wage.
It’s understandable that many consumers won’t see the value in a $200+ shirt. That’s completely understandable and there are many quality shirts available at lower prices.
Posts
I love hamilton's shirts. Top notch quality..
ReplyDeleteYeah right. $245 for a shirt, let alone a non fitted shirt? Suckers born every minute...
ReplyDeleteGreg- Alpha sized as well. I've been wondering what Hamilton has been smoking. Maybe I should ask what the people who buy Hamilton have been smoking.
ReplyDeleteI'm a big believer in buying less, but buying better, but at the same time I'm a believer in not having my wife murder me in my sleep when she sees my credit card statement. For $245 I can practically buy two shirts from Ledbury. I can buy three shirts at J. Crew. It's hard to explain my way around spending that much on one shirt. Some guys can buy them, and good for them. That's not me, though.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the day, it's their business, and they can charge what they want. My larger concern is that there doesn't seem to be a way for a domestic manufacturer to pay people a decent wage, produce a decent product, and put it at a price point where average people can afford it. This is the bigger issue at play, and one I'm just not sure about. We've neglected our textile industry for 30+ years now, and the consequences, as we can see, is that if you want to make a domestic product, with domestic workers, you have to ask your customers to really shell out for it. Until we somehow get to the point where it's more of a mass product, I don't see how that can change.
David - Check out Mercer and Sons. Made in Maine. Neck and sleeve sized. About a $100 a pop. They're a wonderful value and proof that the good stuff is available. You just have to know where to look.
ReplyDeleteTo each his own but maybe companies like these need to stop over-estimating the demand of these "Premium" manufactured shirts. What's the model anyway? There are company's that have been able to produce quality, well constructed, well fitting shirts at much lower price points for generations. Why not just do that? I know they are not all waving the Made in the USA flag but let's be honest, U.S production isn't always what it's cracked up to be. What's the strategy? I would think with what the U.S has gone through a U.S company would take it on themselves to find a way to make products that are on trend, quality AND affordable for the average consumer. I mean isn't that what we use to do?
ReplyDeleteUS production isn't always good. But there are a handful of makers out there who are not manufacturing in the US 'cause they wanna make a financial killing. They're really artisans, like David Mercer, who don't even want a lot of business.
ReplyDeleteKeep in mind that what we used to do was have most textile manuf in the southeast. Mill towns in NC, SC and GA where the wage was much lower and there were no unions. In effect, apparel manuf have always searched for the lowest manuf cost. Once there, it rises like it's rising in China. The way things are going, manuf could come back to the US because it'll be cheaper than China.
Sorry to say that I shall never buy a shirt that is generically sized. Tell Messrs. Hamilton to go look at Turnbull & Asser, New & Lingwood or Hilditch & Key; sized properly and altered for free (well, free if one is a fairly regular customer).
ReplyDeleteshirts, even...
ReplyDelete$245 for a shirt is pure insanity. This company sounds very, very greedy.
ReplyDelete