The new coolness

It's becoming clear. Two distinct markets. Polar opposite challenges.

On one hand you've got a thousand kids boutiques selling rock 'n' roll clothes to baby-mamas, but barely ever rap or R&B. So while every parent/uncle/friend wants to be "the cool one," we've got to wait for the shopkeepers to get with it, and honestly most haven't heard of M.I.A. (and no, she ain't wearing Ed Hardy)

On the other hand you've got a thousand street wear vendors on the razor's edge of street fashion, but they're too used to being niche. Their clientele traditionally consists of young, early-adopters who would likely see the novelty in getting a kid they know hooked up, but most street vendors haven't considered any audience outside what's worked already. If it ain't broke, don't fix it — not a very forward-looking stance for trend-setters.

Here's the thing — I hate being a convincer. You either see something or you don't. But it seems crazy to me nobody is thinking about how every single trend in fashion history has somehow "trickled up." Same old story; youth stakes out some territory, and then slowly it seeps upward into older, more conservative generations until it finally gains "normality" in some altered form throughout society.

Take baseball caps. In the '80s if you're wearing a hat you were probably of college age or younger (unless you were at a game or a truck driver). Now I swear there's an army of dudes in their 60's wearing that shit in their BMW convertables. Sure, maybe it helps hide the bald spot, but that wasn't happening even 10 years back.

Flash forward to today, and older generations "don't get" kids wearing the same hats kicked to the side. Here's a message to all you older folks: we wear it that way because you don't get it. We do it to separate ourselves from you. As always, youth creates the new coolness. You broke in long hair — thanks for that.

And it just so happens that the new coolness of the moment is street wear, which happens to be Pre-K Apparel's advantage, and our challenge.

We're sick of all the cliche kids' wear out there and are trying like hell to break the new coolness for them. But to do that we somehow need to do two things: help kids' apparel stores be okay selling street wear and help street wear stores be okay selling kids' apparel. As of right now it seems both vendors are too busy with business as usual, so nobody's breaking through to be down with both (except you, Karmaloop, you nasty visionaries —props!).

I guess being the first ones to the party can really blow sometimes, but we're not trying to wait around for company. Fuck it — I may just have to suck it up and become a convincer.