Jobber Profile - Barr Wholesale—An Interview with Jeff Barr
by Robert Nordstrom
In the late 1970s, thousands of college students descended on Fort Lauderdale, Florida to vent their youthful energy on the beaches and in the bars during the yearly spring break ritual. The competition among the bars and nightclubs lining the beach was as hot as the red blistering skin of the sunbathers, who needed not only a cold drink but a light cotton garment to cover those blisters.
Enter three brothers from Detroit, Michigan looking for…no, not a quick suntan and a pretty girl…but a business opportunity that they could develop as a family. And, lo and behold, they found it in t-shirts—the perfect apparel item to do double duty covering damaged skin while promoting the local watering holes.
The brothers were Howard, Jeff, and Craig Barack. All three were young and recently graduated from various colleges up north. Jeff held a master’s degree in speech pathology and had been teaching special education at a Detroit area school. He took a year’s leave of absence and with his wife Lesa and his two brothers headed south to be closer to their parents.
Borrowed Money and an Old Van
“We were open to anything,” Jeff remembers. “It was the height of the spring break phenomenon in Fort Lauderdale, and the t-shirt craze had not yet peaked. Anyone with t-shirt products was selling them like crazy in and around the Fort Lauderdale area.”
The brothers, thinking that getting in on the t-shirt action might be just the ticket to get them started in business, borrowed $3,000 from their aunt in Michigan, hopped in an old van they owned, and drove north toward the apparel mills then scattered throughout the South. They found a mill in Virginia, bought $3,000 worth of blank tees, and headed back to Fort Lauderdale where they peddled their entire van load door to door to the bars and nightclubs on the beach—in three hours time.
“At that time,” Jeff says, “the air brush craze was really hot. The nightclubs bought the blanks, airbrushed them, and gave them away with admission to their bar. It was great advertising on the beach the next day.”
The brothers took their earnings and headed north again to invest in more product.
“At that time,” says Jeff, “t-shirts were being produced domestically. Nearly every small town in the South had a manufacturing plant. All you had to do is pull into a gas station in a small town and ask where the local mill was.”
The brothers were looking for off-price goods—irregulars and overruns. Price was a key concern as they needed to sell the product for 4 or 5 for $5. The fact that the product was off-quality did not matter, says Jeff, “because everything was getting printed or air brushed. Back then, there wasn’t a huge market for off-price goods so most all of the manufacturers had product they wanted to move. They didn’t know what to do with it. We bought t-shirts, ladies’ tees, tank tops—anything that resembled a t-shirt-like product. My wife would pack sandwiches for us and we’d drive all night, load up, drive back, then peddle the product the next day. Spring break allowed us to start a business.”
The Barack Brothers Become the Barr Brothers
Although spring break is great while it lasts, what do you do after the snow birds head back up north? Again, the brothers were at the right place at the right time as the flea markets were just taking off in South Florida. They hauled their product to the markets where they laid it out on long tables to sell retail. Gradually, a few of the other vendors started drifting over to their tables and buying product and the Baracks found themselves moving into the wholesale trade.
At this point, the brothers didn’t even have a name for the business; their warehouse consisted of the living and dining rooms of Jeff’s townhouse. In naming the business, they thought they would keep it simple by using the first three letters of their last name. As it turned out, another business had the market on the “Bar” name so they added another “r” and became “Barr Wholesale.” Little did they know, however, that by naming their business they effectively changed their surname: today, everyone with whom they do business know them as the “Barr” brothers.
When the Party Ends…
In the early 1980s, Fort Lauderdale’s city fathers decided to clean up the city’s act by discouraging students to come for spring break. Many of the nightclubs on the beach closed almost overnight, and for Barr Wholesale, a major revenue stream dried up.
Quick to see opportunity in a crisis, the Barr brothers began developing the wholesale end of their business. Some of the wholesale accounts they had found at the flea markets were asking for prints on the t-shirts so they bought a couple of transfer machines and began doing heat transfers. They worked the coastline in the van selling printed tees to the beach and resort shops. They took the company to a local tradeshow in Miami, picking up accounts in the Caribbean and other areas of the country. They tried a few regional shows outside of Florida and picked up more accounts.
“We’re still servicing accounts from the first regional shows we attended,” Jeff says.
Their first national show was ASD in Las Vegas—around 1986. They took one booth and, according to Jeff, were “swamped” with business.
“We wrote unbelievable business,” Jeff exclaims. “We were still selling domestic product at that time. By then we had established numerous contacts with manufacturers throughout the country and had developed a good reputation. We could offer our customers goods on a regular basis because there were very few people doing what we were doing.”
Growing and Adapting
Today, Barr Wholesale employs 35 employees and works out of a showroom and 30,000 square foot warehouse in Pompano Beach. As the domestic apparel production dried up in the early to mid-‘90s, Barr lost some of their sourcing contacts. In addition, off-quality/irregular product became less available and therefore more costly. Manufacturers’ sorting and grading systems became more liberal, which affected the quality of the off-quality goods. As a result, the Barr brothers decided to get out of the irregular/off-quality business and started selling first-quality goods only.
To make up for the shutdown of domestic production, Barr began doing some contract manufacturing to supplement their closeout inventory. The company also broadened their product line to include fashion fleece.
Jeff says, “From infants to big sizes, we now have a niche where our customers can come to us at any given time and find 100 different styles of fashion fleece in off price. We look for trends at the store level. Our teenage kids help us with that. We’re constantly looking for new ideas, new designs. We manufacture a little bit in order to maintain a steady flow of product to our customers.”
Moving into Embellished Goods
In the late 1990s, Barr moved more strongly into screen printing and embroidery, a move, which according to Jeff, was a turning point for the company.
“Today, we maintain a 60/40 ratio of blank versus embellished goods. The move into embellished goods on a full-scale basis in the late ‘90s gave us an opportunity to sell to customers who normally wouldn’t buy from us. We maintain some very large programs with some big companies, and this year we will embellish well over a half million units. In the last five years, we’ve seen at least 30% growth in the business.”
The Off-Price Specialist Show has served as a key component of this growth. An exhibitor at the show since 1996, Barr has used the show to open new accounts throughout the country.
“The Off-Price Show is an integral part of our business, today,” Jeff says, “both in terms of servicing our existing customers and developing new accounts. We sell a tremendous amount at the show.”
On the Road and In the Office
Between shows, the Barr brothers and their five-person in-house sales staff spend a lot of time on the road visiting customers and vendors. “We’re a hands-on, old-school company,” Jeff says. “We work hard, we’re always on the streets. There’s never a time when someone’s not out traveling to see customers. We want to see what they are doing and check out their stores. It’s very important for us to maintain our relationships with customers, and in my view that requires face-to-face interaction.”
While the three brothers have divided their responsibilities according to their talents, they are constantly communicating with one another. Howard, the oldest brother, handles the daily operations and oversees the warehouse, quality control, and shipping and receiving. Craig, the youngest, is 100% sales driven. And Jeff handles the buying and financial end of the business. Jeff’s wife, Lesa, takes care of the bookkeeping.
“We’re workaholics,” Jeff says. “On any given Saturday or Sunday, you’ll catch one of us here at the office. We’ve had our spats over the years but we’ve always had each other’s back. Regardless of the argument, we’ve always come to work the next day as if nothing happened.”
On a more somber note, Barr Wholesale recently lost a key employee who had been with the company since the very first day. Rita Pati, who managed the office, passed away in August.
“Everyone in the industry knew Rita,” Jeff says. “She was our leader, she never missed work. Her passing has left a big void in our heart.”
Serving the Customer
Barr Wholesale serves a diverse customer base—from mom-and-pop stores to mid-size retail chains. In addition to the company’s traditional beach and resort accounts, Barr sells blank goods to screen printing and embroidery wholesale accounts throughout the country. The company conducts a lot of business with independent general merchandise retailers, particularly throughout the Midwest.
According to Jeff, in this tough retail environment, “niche-driven retailers are doing better. We’re doing a lot of business with the outdoor/sporting goods stores. They’re buying our goods as an alternative to some of the branded sportswear. But it’s a tough market for retailers. The prices they are able to charge keep going down while overhead keeps going up.”
While all of these factors conspire against the small business owner, Barr has been successful through the years because it offers a unique product as well as great perceived value for their off-price merchandise. Customers receive goods sized, sorted, bar coded, and ready for the floor.
The customer is always right,” Jeff says. “We refund, we credit, no questions asked. We run an old-school business. That’s what you have to do to survive.”
According to Jeff, a typical comment of retailers today is “we need nothing but customers.” But to get customers, the Barr brothers understand, retailers need quality service and new and fresh product.
“That’s why we’re constantly out on the road. You have to get the product in front of the customer.”
While the old van the Barr brothers used to source product throughout the South may be resting peacefully in its rusty grave, their commitment to great product and quality service will never change.
