Irvine-based Fly Industries LLC, maker of Black Flys sunglasses, is notorious for its bad boy image.
The sunglass maker built a name for itself in the 1990s with cool looking shades and raunchy marketing.
Think triple-X videos, brawls at parties, strippers doing cocaine at Black Flys’ booth during tradeshows and ads in porn magazines.
“Black Flys will always have a bad boy image,” said Arty Hargrove, national sales manager.
But these days Black Flys is more about business than flash.
A big reason: money.
The company needs to raise some money to build display cases for stores that sell its sunglasses, Hargrove said.
Black Flys has several stores that want to carry its shades but the company “cannot supply store fixtures,” he said.
Each display costs in the neighborhood of $700 to $900, and Black Flys has more than 500 stores waiting for one.
That’s set to cost the company some $40,000.
“The old saying, ‘It takes money to make money’ is no bullshit,” Hargrove said.
To generate cash, Black Flys wants to grow its private label business, where it makes sunglasses for companies under their brands.
Such customers include Hard Rock Hotel, Celebrity Sunglasses and West Coast Choppers, Hargrove said.
Black Flys has seen its share of troubles.
The company, which doesn’t disclose sales, spent the past few years working hard to regain some footing after partying, operation glitches and late orders hampered business.
“We still have shops that won’t carry us for stuff we did over 10 years ago,” Hargrove said. “Some shops love us. Some hate us.”
Apparel veteran Ivan Spiers, who owns nZania LLC, threw the company a lifeline in 2000 and took over its manufacturing under contract.
“Basically, (he) kept us in business,” Hargrove said.
Low-profile Spiers, a savvy marketer known for reviving struggling brands, buys inventory for Black Flys and handles shipping, Hargrove said.
That way stores get their orders on time and Black Flys can concentrate on design and keeping up with competition.
Two years ago, Black Flys moved its headquarters from Costa Mesa to Irvine so it could be closer to nZania, Hargrove said. NZania also is based in Irvine.
The brand has been making staff changes “for the better,” Hargrove said.
“We got rid of people who weren’t working at 100%,” he said.
Black Flys has 14 people in Irvine and 18 sales representatives around the country who are paid on commission.
In addition to sunglasses, it also sells goggles, T-shirts, sweatshirts, hats and watches.
“It’s really hard,” Hargrove said of competition. “Kids want new stuff and we’re not new anymore.”
The sunglasses market is cutthroat. Black Flys has seen its market share get picked off by brands that include Von Zipper, part of Irvine-based Billabong USA, San Clemente-based Electric Visual Evolution and Foothill Ranch-based Oakley Inc., which is about to be bought by Italy’s Luxottica Group SPA.
Luxottica also owns Ray Ban and Arnette Optical Illusions Inc., which started in OC, among other brands.
Most of Black Flys competitors have deeper pockets, Hargrove said.
But Black Flys likes being independent and doesn’t “want to listen to guys in suits telling us what to do,” Hargrove said.
Jack A. Martinez, who started the company with $40,000 some 17 years ago, and longtime partner Dan Flecky still own the company.
Black Flys sells its shades in more than 1,400 stores in the U.S. They range from surf and skateboarding shops to sporting good stores, such as Sport Chalet, to tattoo parlors. It even sells to online retailer www.zappos.com.
The number of stores it sells at is down about 20% from five years ago, mainly because of consolidation and Luxottica buying stores and kicking out brands it doesn’t own, Hargrove said.
“It sucks,” he said. “But what are you going to do?”
Black Flys also has its own shops called House of Flys. There are nine of them, including one in Costa Mesa, which is owned by the company. The rest are licensed.
The brand continues to have a following.
Black Flys “has generated a lifelong customer who keeps coming back and buying our product,” Hargrove said.
Black Flys tries to stand out by being original and “setting trends,” Hargrove said.
The company recently launched 11 sunglass styles, seven for men and four for women.
“We can’t reinvent the sunglass,” Hargrove said. “But we can pay attention” to texture, embellishments and shape.
One new Flys sunglass style for women is oversized with stone embellishments near the lenses. One men’s design has a giant silver fishing hook on the frame, which comes with polarized lenses for fishermen.
Martinez is big on fishing, Hargrove said.
Black Flys also makes different garb under license, such as snowboards and girls clothing.
The company recently signed a licensing agreement with K Optics in Los Angeles to make a line of prescription frames, which launches next spring, Hargrove said.
“We’re excited to have that drive Black Flys” and get the brand placed in different eyeglasses and sunglasses shops, Hargrove said.
The company also plans to make a bigger online push. But first it has to iron out a fight over its Web site.
Black Flys now sells its shades on www.flys.com.
The domain name, www.blackflys.com, was bought several years ago,before Black Flys went online,by a person who says on the site they were using it for “entertainment news, journalism, action sports and movie reviews” among other things.
Hargrove said Black Flys tried to get the domain back but the owner “kept demanding ridiculous amounts of money.”
“For 2008, it is our goal to get legal with him,” Hargrove said. “Our Internet sales have increased 18% to 20% a year so we think with www.blackflys.com it will be even better. We just never wanted to spend all the legal fees to get it back.”
