![]() “He really crafted the category and he deserves a lot of credit for that.” “He was really inventing a category that wasn’t part of the ongoing experience, but it became a part of the authentic experience,” said former NBA Commissioner David Stern in November of 2019, weeks before an aneurysm would claim his life. The dugouts and sidelines being a season-long fashion show that includes alternate uniforms? That’s all Starter and the companies that followed in its footsteps. Ever sought a specific brand name because it was what the team wears? That’s Beckerman too. Ever rushed to buy championship gear after a win? That’s Beckerman. What he left is a legacy that lives on in the seemingly endless amount of fan apparel available. “How could the company that put that in front of millions of people on television be out of business?” he wondered.īeckerman put a lot of his things on television. When Evans walked out of the warehouse he came face to face with the floor-to-ceiling mural on the wall of the University of Florida Gators scoring a touchdown in the National Championship Game a couple of years earlier, dressed head-to-toe in Starter uniforms. Starter was indeed closing, filing for Chapter 11 that very day. Yet the company was finding it harder to compete with the shoe companies who were gobbling up the league partnerships-relationships that in many cases had been personally forged by Beckerman. “Anywhere there was an athlete or a team, we were there.” “You couldn’t miss Starter,” said Marcy Silverman, who worked in marketing for the company until it folded and whose father, Billy, designed Starter’s logo. Starter was outfitting athletes and celebrities, and then an entire nation of sports fans who were clamoring for the merchandise because it was on athletes and celebrities. ![]() The brand had become one of the most recognized in not just sports apparel but in clothing, grossing nearly $700 million in annual sales at its peak. He had created this company almost 30 years ago with a simple satin jacket sample he kept in the trunk of his car, growing the small manufacturer from an outfitter of local bowling teams and little leagues to Pro Bowlers and the Major Leagues. There, Beckerman addressed his employees. ![]() ![]() “I really felt like there was a change coming in where we were heading with the product.”Ī couple of hours later, a company-wide email requested everyone meet in the second-floor warehouse. “I felt really good about our product line that year,” said Bob Felice, who doubled as Vice President of International Sales and Beckerman’s son-in-law. They were preparing a slew of new clothing items for release in the coming months. Starter still supplied uniforms to a handful of professional teams and were one of the biggest licensees in MLB with the clothier’s famous satin jacket. With Beckerman’s charisma and vision, a few employees believed the band was back together. Some in the office felt like the culture was slowly returning to where it had been in the company’s heyday. ![]() Who has time to worry about balance sheets when you’re playing phone tag with Bill Parcells? Originally from nearby Shelton, he was in his 11th year at Starter after talking his way in as the company’s first intern, ultimately climbing the ranks to operate as a liaison between the teams and the manufacturer, making sure players and coaches wore the correct products on the sidelines so that the apparel line’s infamous “S with a star” logo was visible. I was just shipping out more hats to the Vikings.”Įvans admitted he hadn’t paid attention to the warning signs as closely as he probably could have. Really? So extreme?” he said, incredulous. But a restructuring of the top brass months earlier had brought back company founder, David Beckerman, to lead Starter and to work out loan agreements to stay solvent. It wasn’t a secret that the company had fallen on hard times since the manufacturer had transitioned from privately owned to publicly held six years earlier, and posted substantial losses in the most recent few quarters. As he checked his messages, an employee from the company’s finance department walked in, closed the door and sat down. Evans was the Professional Teams Coordinator at athletic apparel manufacturer Starter and was tasked with making sure drafted players wore the right caps at the podium. Kurt Evans drifted into his New Haven office on the Monday morning of April 19, 1999, hours after working the NFL Draft that weekend. ![]()
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