Trade Shows, Future of Wholesale & How Handbags Changed Retail | Emily Blumenthal & Dorothy Belshaw
episode
Handbag Designer 101: The Stories Behind Handbag Designers, Brands, and Industry Icons
39 min
2 speakers
3 chapters
transcribed 1 month ago
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Yeah, I think for so many years, women would spend money on a couple of very expensive handbags, right? Yeah. And those were their kind of workhorses. And one for day and a couple for evening and one for summer, one for winter, right? Now, suddenly, it becomes part of... your persona, right? As a woman or, and it is, it's part of how you're presenting yourself to the world. And so it became like an accessory that was as important as jewelry and as changeable as jewelry. And we started to see that in the gift sector because more and more stores were like, Hey, wait a minute. Women are buying a lot of handbags. I need to carry some.
Hi, and welcome to Handbag Designer 101, the podcast with your host, Emily Blumenthal, handbag industry expert and the handbag fairy godmother. Each week, we uncover the stories behind the handbags we love from the iconic brands and top designers to the creativity, craftsmanship, and culture that define the handbag world. Whether you're a designer, collector, or simply passionate about handbags, this is your front row seat to it all.
Welcome, Dorothy Belshaw, CEO and co-owner of my most favorite trade show in the whole wide world, New York Now. Welcome to Handbag Designer 101, the podcast.
Thank you. I'm so happy to be here. The opportunity to talk about what we're doing.
Oh my goodness. I'm so, so excited as everybody has heard me go on and on and on about that we have this incredible footprint at New York Now called the It Back X New York Now, where we have my most favorite word, curated. We have a curated group of 10 designers from across the globe that we have handpicked that have DNA and something new. And most trade shows are trying to fill the void, which I believe New York Now does very well. that the market is lacking is newness, innovation, fresh, destination. So we're super excited to come back for our third show, fourth show. I can't even keep up. No, this is our fourth. This is our fourth show.
Yeah.
Oh my goodness. My first with you, but it's your fourth. I know, I know. It's like to be re-virginized into the trade show territory is all very exciting. So, Dorothy, let's go way back. How did this, like, why trade shows? How did this happen?
That's way back. Vintage. Yeah. I was working for the college that I went to. Which was? Hamilton College, small liberal arts, upstate New York, close to nothing, where I was an English major. And Coming out of that experience, I stayed on to work for the college. And I wrote all of their corporate and foundation grants for several years. And my goal was to write grant proposals, move back to New York, where I'm from. I'm a native New Yorker. And, you know, work for, I don't know, the New York Public Library or the Ford Foundation or something like that. But along the way, I met a member of the board of directors at Hamilton University. Guy named Jeff Little and a company called George Little Management.
He was third generation of that family business, which was kind of the original trade show producer in the United States.
Oh, my God. Right place, right time. Did he go to Hamilton?
He did. So, you know, I was moving back to New York and I'd worked with him just... because I connected with the board a lot in my role at Hamilton. And he said, oh, you're coming back to New York. What are you going to be doing? I said, I'm going to, you know, I'm going to work for nonprofits. I'm going to write proposals. He was like, well, why don't you come work for me and my business? Like we could use a writer. Like he had a magazine that they produced in association with their trade shows. He said you could write for that magazine. I had no idea what the trade show business was. Honestly, no idea about the gift industry, really. I mean, So I went and walked a show. I found it so exhilarating, so exciting.
I'd never been to one. It was like this access to creativity on a very different level. Were they still smoking in the shows? Oh, yeah. Smoking and all the women were wearing four-inch heels and it was a whole other ballgame. It was back in the 90s.
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Chapters
3 chaptersSpeakers
2 identifiedMore from Handbag Designer 101: The Stories Behind Handbag Designers, Brands, and Industry Icons
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