Allan Bernstein still goes by “Doc,” even though he’s traded the precise work of foot and ankle surgery for the fickle and trying business of growing a T-shirt company.
“When I walk into a store as Dr. Bernstein, people want to wait on me,” he said. “When I walk in as Doc the T-shirt salesman, people aren’t so anxious to talk to me.”
Bernstein’s company, Ethnicitee Apparel Co., designs T-shirts using postage stamp art from all over the world.
“I try to celebrate what’s beautiful and positive about the world,” he said.
He holds up a shirt featuring an ancient astronomer on a triangular-shaped stamp from the Emirate of Sharjah, one of the largest in the United Arab Emirates. Arabs were one of the first astronomers, he said.
Another shirt has a stamp from Rwanda.
“Rwanda has been war torn, yet it’s a beautiful agrarian society,” Bernstein said.
His best selling shirt features an Albert Einstein stamp from Israel.
“Every subject known to mankind is depicted on stamps,” Bernstein said.
Bernstein said he’d be happy selling $3 million to $5 million worth of T-shirts within five years. That makes Ethnicitee a tiny player within Orange County’s crowded field of apparel companies. It might be the only one headed by a onetime foot surgeon turned global-minded T-shirt designer.
Other than being a T-shirt fan, Bernstein has not had any fashion training. But he seems to have a knack for design. It’s cracking the industry that’s proved challenging, as he’s enduring an uphill battle to get his shirts into stores.
|
|
Cayman Island stamp shirt for women: shirts sell for about $25 |
Some have warmly received his T-shirts. Others not so much. He said he designed a line specifically with a major retailer in mind, but the buyer wasn’t interested.
Some retailers balk because they look at the shirts from a stamp collector viewpoint, he said. Stamp collecting is more nerdy than hip.
Bernstein said he’s been told, “I really dig it but can you lose the stamp idea?” or “But where do you go from that?”
“If they get it, they get it,” he said.
Some stores welcome the stamp idea. On Board, a men’s clothes shop in Laguna Beach, carries the line.
Manager Jon Dougherty said the T-shirts have sold well.
“Everything was tied back to a stamp,” he said. “The artwork was unique. It had a little story to it.”
Staff at On Board’s 1,200-square-foot store can take the time to sell the brand, Dougherty said.
Ethnicitee T-shirts also are sold at Garys in Newport Beach, in a few men’s boutiques in Chicago and online at Ethnicitee.net.
Bernstein focuses on men’s T-shirts with some designs for women.
“A life free of violence” shirt, featuring a stamp issued by the Cayman Islands, is the most popular women’s T-shirt, he said.
Bernstein started the Ethnicitee line, which is made in OC, about a year ago.
“We have not broken even yet, but we’re on our way,” he said.
The goal is to keep knocking on doors, Bernstein said.
“It’s a matter of getting a break,that a large retailer will pick you up and push your brand,” he said.
The slow economy, which has been particularly hard on clothing stores, makes it tough to hawk a new line, Bernstein said. Many stores are cutting back on the clothes they carry.
Why T-shirts and not shoes or something else?
“They’re the modern billboard,” he said. “Every expression and thought is put on a
T-shirt.”
The bigger question: Why did he go from being a surgeon to T-shirt designer?
Bernstein said his grandfather inspired him to become a foot and ankle surgeon. His grandfather was the head tailor for men’s store Boyds Philadelphia, based in the city where Bernstein is from.
But Bernstein said he became disenchanted with the business of healthcare. And a hockey accident resulted in a broken hand and damaged nerves, a hindrance in surgery. That left him to ponder another career, he said.
Eventually, he enrolled in the healthcare master’s of business administration program at the University of California, Irvine.
“When I was sitting in those classes, I had an epiphany,” he said. “I didn’t think dissecting a company could be as interesting as dissecting a human body, but it was.”
He said he found an affinity for marketing.
“It’s amazing to me how you package something and present it,” Bernstein said.
He went into healthcare consulting in the late 1990s and still does consulting to pay for his business.
Bernstein said he came up with the stamp idea for T-shirts while preparing for Hebrew classes he was teaching at the time.
“I came upon a Web site that taught the Holocaust in stamps,” he said. “I filed that to the back of my mind.”
Ethnicitee has licensing deals to use stamp images and pays fees based on sales.
The shirts use a whole stamp or incorporate part of one into the design. The stamps and their cultural history are always the inspiration for the design, Bernstein said.
Ethnicitee donates 10% of its proceeds go to Charity: Water, which provides clean drinking water to people in developing nations.
“It’s a business venture,” Bernstein said. “But I want to write large checks for children’s causes. That’s what gives me the greatest reward.”
