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Got blocked by Simmons Bilt Instagram because my comment

Sloan1874

I'll Lock Up
Messages
8,425
Location
Glasgow
It is interesting that the likes of Goodwear, Aero and even Bill Kelso have avoided going down this particular rabbit hole. It's a very quick way to alienate a large chunk of your potential customers.
 

Peacoat

*
Bartender
Messages
6,445
Location
South of Nashville
Yes the big beards and fades are ruling the day over there. Let's not forget the obligatory pipe as well. Although I have to say, I've never seen a pic of Debs before...she's good looking...for some reason not at all what I would've pictured.
I went looking for a picture of Debs, said to be good looking and found this: "Introducing The Simmons Bilt Clothing Company, a brand born out of the solid foundations laid down by the Alexander Leather brand . . . ." And exactly where did this "solid foundation laid down by the Alexander Leather brand" come from? I am really having a difficult time understanding that they actually said this on their homepage. And I never got to see a picture of Debs.Can someone point me to her picture?
 

AllanP

Familiar Face
Messages
82
I went looking for a picture of Debs, said to be good looking and found this: "Introducing The Simmons Bilt Clothing Company, a brand born out of the solid foundations laid down by the Alexander Leather brand . . . ." And exactly where did this "solid foundation laid down by the Alexander Leather brand" come from? I am really having a difficult time understanding that they actually said this on their homepage. And I never got to see a picture of Debs.Can someone point me to her picture?

Go to their instagram, I think the woman that appears in all their recent photos is Debs
 

jacketjunkie

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,318
Location
Germany
I find it a tad disrespectful to put up a man's wife up for ratings here; this is the fedoralounge and not the stylecheck pages of the InTouch. What does it even matter what she looks like; what does matter is that she's a very friendly and helpful person to deal with from all I can tell from experience.

Edit; the close up of the leather is indeed very comparable to my JL naked cowhide M-200, not saying it isn't horse though, my Aero Teamster has panels who's grain look very close, too.
 
Messages
17,490
Location
Chicago
^ this is it. I certainly meant no disrespect to Debs. She's a wonderful woman and was quite helpful and friendly every time I worked with her. I apologize for my comment and wish I hadn't made it.
I guess the point is you may have a preconceived notion about someone and then when you see the reality it's a bit of a surprise. Debs is lovely in every way. That's all I meant.
 
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Edward

Bartender
Messages
25,074
Location
London, UK
I think it's pretty clear what happened here for anyone who has been around a few years. Back around 2012, the Caulders discovered that Will Lauder, then MD of Aero, had been up to mischief, including passing off steerhide as FQHH. A perfectly good hide in its own right, but ultimately cheaper to produce, and not what the customer had ordered and paid for. This became known as the 'sTorse' scandal. I'm sure hte old threads are all still here. Lauder left Aero under a cloud; it also came out that he had helped himself to GBP200K's worth of stock, and he did prison time for that. After leaving Aero, Will had been involved in setting up Alexander Leathers; after his conviction, Will left their employment and AL rebranded itself as Simmonds Bilt. SB continue to be controversial for one reason and another, though clearly they attract enough custom to stay in business. I imagine they don't relish the association with Lauder now, and would rather shut down a comment which they obviously read as a reference to the Storse controversy than have it all flare up again. It seems that's what simply happened here: OP has made perhaps an innocent comment but it has been interpreted as trolling and blocked. In the context, I don't think this is entirely surprising.

Haha! Yeah, this seems to be Iron Heart country. The horror, the horror.

Iron Heart have long seemed to attract a certain customer profile. I guess that's the nature of niche businesses! Looked at some of their stuff a long time ago myself, but was put off dealing with them for one reason or another. Not looked for a long time - did they stick with SB after the rebrand? I remember tem starting out with Aero then moving to AL with Will. The leather jackets that were made for them at Aero looked nicely done early on, though I couldn't have lived with the comically over-sized zips they specified.
 

l0fielectronic

Practically Family
Messages
666
Location
UK
Know what you mean. Funnily enough, I tried on a pair of IH 23oz jeans at the Aero sale last year and they were pretty unspectacular in cut and doing the buttons up was a nightmare. I was not standing in the changing room thinking, 'these are worth all the £££ that IH want.


I did buy a pair of these two/three years back and they are my absolute favourite jeans at least for the spring/autumn/winter.

What made me laugh was I did pick up a second new/unworn pair in black from eBay last year and experiencing exactly what you said - once again trying to get the damn things done up for the first dozen times had me both questioning my sanity and laughing at myself at the ridiculousness of it. But again, a week or two in and they softened up...

The only thing I'm sad about is since Iron Heart UK blocked sellers abroad selling/posting to the UK is that I'll have to pay their full price for a pair when these wear out. That said I will most likely do that.
 

Edward

Bartender
Messages
25,074
Location
London, UK
The only thing I'm sad about is since Iron Heart UK blocked sellers abroad selling/posting to the UK is that I'll have to pay their full price for a pair when these wear out. That said I will most likely do that.

I've always found that sort of protectionism frustrating when you can buy them in other states at a fraction of the UK price (very common, especially back when the pound was still worth something against the US dollar), but to be fair to Iron Heart it is standard practice across most consumer goods industries where there's a UK distributor. Why would the local distributor take the business on, after all, if they had to compete with much cheaper personal imports? It's more of an issue, of course, since the web made it practical for individuals to order internationally.
 

willyto

One Too Many
Messages
1,616
Location
Barcelona
I've always found that sort of protectionism frustrating when you can buy them in other states at a fraction of the UK price (very common, especially back when the pound was still worth something against the US dollar), but to be fair to Iron Heart it is standard practice across most consumer goods industries where there's a UK distributor. Why would the local distributor take the business on, after all, if they had to compete with much cheaper personal imports? It's more of an issue, of course, since the web made it practical for individuals to order internationally.

If you can't mantain a business you don't open it. As simple as that, why do customers have to pay more just because they live in another country? If buying from another country which ironically is the one where the product is made is cheaper, why would a client find useful to have to buy from his own country at the expense of paying a premium price? We live in a globally connected world and trying to put barriers to it it's dumb.

Happens with a lot of products and I'm not falling for it. I've bought stuff from Japan directly and I've payed for the items including shipping almost half the price and it came faster than from the UK! From Japan in 2 days at half the price including shipping. Why would I buy from the UK with a worse price and a worse and slower shipping? You don't punish the customer if you can't do it better, you try to offer a better customer service instead and if you can't then you shouldn't blame the customers for doing what it's best for them.
 

Graemsay

Practically Family
Messages
994
Location
Melbourne
I've got a pair of the Iron Heart 1955 21/23 oz jeans too @l0fielectronic. I've had them for four years, and they're starting to show signs of blowing out in the crotch. Admittedly, they don't get as much wear these days as Melbourne is often too warm.

As for distribution, I believe that the deal is that Haraki has Japan, whereas Giles and Iron Heart UK runs the distribution for the rest of the world.

Giles tends to keep prices pretty similar in his territory. There'll be some fluctuations due to currency movements, but these are what a pair of IH-634S costs from various retailers around the world.
The ex-tax price for the 634s is ¥24,000, which is £164. Add on UK VAT and that rises to £197, then there's import duties (5%) and postage (both included in what Iron Heart UK charges), and it's probably not a big difference.

I agree that some of the other Japanese brands can be sourced much cheaper via Rakuten.
 

l0fielectronic

Practically Family
Messages
666
Location
UK
I will say their customer service is always second to none and they've done all the work to market and expand the brand into the Europe/US market in the first place so I can see its kind of a unique case but it has priced the brand pretty much out of my general range, I would still replace the jeans as I've not come across anything I like more but thats as far as I'd go.

I haven't done that much research into priceing as yourself but before this deal came to be I bought a slighlty lighter pair from Japan for under £200 door to door, I think about £180 from memory. At the time the same pair would've cost me £320 from the UK so it was a fair difference. Obviously currency fluctuations and such will affect things though as you say though.
 

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