Dallas, TX, Mar. 22--Thousands of merchandise decision-makers and some of the world's hottest designers, from Richard Tyler and Kay Unger to Yansi Fugel and David Meister, will descend on Dallas this week, according to the Dallas Morning News.
And it isn't for a Neiman Marcus anniversary extravaganza.
Fashion's top guns are coming from New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta and beyond to check out the industry's newest wholesale market.
FashionCenterDallas opens Thursday on the campus of Dallas Market Center with hopes of redefining Big D as a one-stop destination for buyers ready to stock the nation's stores with the latest looks.
Dallas Market Center, owned by Dallas-based Crow Holdings, spent $21 million on the new mall for merchants, which replaces the 40-year-old International Apparel Mart.
Located inside the 15-story World Trade Center, out of the public's reach, FashionCenterDallas houses 550 permanent showrooms and more than 650 temporary exhibitors in 1 million square feet of space devoted to men's, women's and children's apparel. Under the same atrium roof is an additional 2 million square feet of showrooms for gifts, jewelry, home accessories, table-top items, furniture, lighting and toys.
"It's all about the buyers," said Bill Winsor, chief executive officer of Market Center, who has seen some of the apparel industry's longtime customers go out of business and competitive retail prices squeeze the margins of others. "It's a daunting, emotional, high-energy experience. There's a lot of tension involved in making product decisions, and buyers have less time today than they've ever had. We're trying to make it easier for them."
"I'm thrilled about this," said Joseph Salazar, owner of Just Joe, which sells contemporary women's fashions from showrooms in Dallas and Atlanta. "My buyers are totally digging it. About a dozen of my customers in the Southeast are coming here next week instead of later in Atlanta." New York is in a class by itself as a wholesale center, but there's nothing else like Dallas now, he said.
"I think this is going to put Dallas back on the map. It's going to be as exciting as the 1980s."
The newly configured and remodeled World Trade Center is tightly organized by category for ease of shopping, which is expected to give Dallas an advantage over other regional marts in Los Angeles, Atlanta and Chicago.
Regional wholesale markets, including Dallas, struggled through the 1990s as the industry they serve radically changed after a booming expansion in the 1970s and 1980s.
Twenty to 30 years ago, when thousands of people moved to here weekly, Dallas Market Center was part of the glamour that made Dallas a top Sun Belt city.
It was a fashion destination for shops that were popping up in strip centers and malls as fast as suburban sprawl surrounded them. This happened not only in Dallas but in Houston, Midland, Tulsa, Okla., and Shreveport, La., and cities in between. It was repeated in Georgia, Florida, California and Arizona.
A growing number of women in the workforce needed more career apparel and leisure sportswear. Good economic times, double incomes and delayed childbearing made shop till you drop a mantra for the weekends.
"There would be buyers lined up waiting to get into showrooms during market," remembered Scott Harner, a Flower Mound-based manufacturer's representative who has a showroom at Market Center. "Business has changed a lot in the last 10 to 15 years. There are fewer retailers, and it seems like more manufacturers. Competition is fierce."
Casual dress trends, the expansion of national chain stores with their own clothes -- from the Gap and Banana Republic to Abercrombie & Fitch and Chico's -- have changed the wholesale market.
Baby boomers and their offspring abandoned the store loyalty of prior generations and adopted cheap chic from Target.
