Joan Weinstein didn’t go away mad, she just didn’t go away.
More Top Picks Best Resin 3d Printers For Miniatures
As Chicago’s fashion mavens know, Weinstein was shoved aside at Ultimo, the tony Oak Street boutique she ran for decades, by the venture capitalists she brought in to expand her empire. It was a less-than-grand exit for Weinstein two years ago, and she sought refuge in California as she formulated what she wanted to do next.
Turns out that what she wants to do is to help launch a new store that will compete directly with Ultimo. In fact, Weinstein is acting as a paid consultant to Ikram Goldman, a former top-selling saleswoman at Ultimo, who plans to open Ikram, a high-end women’s apparel boutique, March 1. The new store will be in the Bristol building at 873 N. Rush St., only a few blocks from Ultimo.
“We’re trying to make it a store where you can find things you don’t find in other stores,” says Weinstein, who recently spent five weeks on a European buying trip with Goldman but is not an investor in the store. “I’m going to stay with her until it all goes well.”
For her part, Goldman says the store is a realization of a longstanding dream. She promises to offer customers a mix of startling new merchandise such as metal and mesh hats from Paris as well as established names such as Valentino and Alexander McQueen.
“My store is going to be my vision,” Goldman says. “I can’t wait until it unfolds.”
Although Ikram hasn’t even opened its doors yet, some Ultimo customers already are buzzing about it. At this point, with nothing concrete to judge Ikram by, several say they are keeping an open mind.
“I’m not going to run over there because Joan’s helping her, but I’m open to seeing her store,” says Deborah Lund, a Chicago interior designer and loyal Ultimo shopper. “It’s kind of like Neiman Marcus and Saks–people go to both.”
Barbara Kaplan Israel agrees that there’s room for two high-end boutiques. But Israel, a stockbroker who likes to live on the fashion edge, says she couldn’t be happier with the fashions she has been finding at Ultimo since its new owner, Sara Nygren, took over last year.
“Sara has a very sophisticated attitude about what she needs instead of just filling the store with a lot of stuff,” Israel says. “I really enjoy shopping there.”
One of her latest Ultimo finds: a Viktor & Rolf suit she saw actress Julianne Moore wearing in a New York Times photo.
Nygren has more mixed feelings about the venture. Already, Weinstein and Goldman’s buying trip has created confusion among designers about which store is the true Ultimo. Still, she is taking the high road about Weinstein’s return.
“We saw a couple stores open this year such as Kate Spade and BCBG, and we were more than happy to welcome them to the neighborhood,” Nygren says. “A strong retail environment is good for everybody.”
Hindsight: Roger Goddu, chief executive of Montgomery Ward & Co. , had one of the most unpleasant tasks a CEO can face last week: telling his employees and managers that the company is going out of business.
Goddu spent Wednesday evening breaking the bad news to executives at Wards’ headquarters at 535 W. Chicago Ave. His remarks, which were distributed to all employees Thursday, offered interesting insight into why the end was inevitable.
His overriding conclusion: Wards’ “single biggest issue all along was not having critical mass store density in most of our markets. This resulted in great inefficiencies in our operation including our ad expense rate, our distribution expense rate and ultimately the sales productivity of our stores.
“While we could have fixed most of our stores through the cost of a remodel, the critical mass density issue would still not be addressed.”
That’s hardly a revelation, retail consultants say. Some of them suggested as much three years ago when Wards entered Chapter 11 the first time and shut 100 stores.
Too bad General Electric Co. had to pump another $1 billion into a retail proposition that was too scattered to ever thrive.
———–
Contact [email protected].
More Top Picks Best Honey Extractors For Backyard Beekeepers