California Apparel News

Reality-television producers scouting for new stars are increasingly coming up with fashion executives.

In January, established executives Trina Turk and Steven Shaul appeared on episodes of reality shows “The Apprentice” and “High Maintenance 90210,” respectively. Los Angeles–based executives Christian Audigier and Dominick Deluca are pitching separate reality TV series, which will focus on the daily lives of running their businesses.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles designer Jeffrey Sebelia is riding a wave of notoriety as the winner of the third season of Bravo TV’s fashion reality show, “Project Runway.”

While nothing in their working lives may prepare them for long shoots, or reality TV’s seemingly omnipresent risk of public embarrassment, these executives seek the glare of television’s bright lights, all for the chance to broadcast the name of their companies to a possible audience of millions. The risk is worth it, according to Janine Blain of New York–based fashion and retail consultancy The Doneger Group.

“Exposure is exposure, and getting a brand’s name out there is the key to success today,” Blain said.

If that means looking a little silly, so be it, according to Shaul, the founder and president of Vernon, Calif.–based Jelessy, maker of women’s premium denim.

“Sixty to 70 percent of the viewers are potential Jelessy customers,” Shaul said. “If they watch this show, they can meet the man behind Jelessy.”

Shaul’s episode of “High Maintenance 90210” was screened on the E! Network on Jan. 29 and was watched by an audience of more than 260,000 people, mostly women, according to an E! Network representative.

In Shaul’s episode, professional butler Craig Vowels auditions to work at Shaul’s mansion, located above the exclusive Sunset Plaza shopping district in Los Angeles. Vowels’ Herculean task is to get the house ready for a party that night.

While the show’s dramatic tension would be familiar to fans of the 1970s sitcom “The Odd Couple,” in which a neat, finicky man locks horns with a man who can tolerate a messy room, Shaul said that the show’s outcome was novel.

In the two days following the show’s screening, Shaul reported receiving more than 800 calls from business associates and well-wishers. He also said that two TV producers contacted him to appear on other reality shows.

The publicity has not yet turned into dollars, Shaul said. The Jelessy founder did not report an increase in sales because he had already completed orders for his Spring line when the episode appeared.

Trina Turk said that reality TV did not do much for the sales of her self-named contemporary label, but it boosted interest in her brand, based in the Los Angeles suburb of Alhambra.

She appeared on Donald Trump’s reality show, “The Apprentice,” on Jan. 14, and traffic on her company Web site, www.trinaturk.com, skyrocketed for a couple of days after the show screened. But few of the visitors purchased any fashions on the Web site. “They were just checking out the site,” she said. “In terms of actual sales online, the numbers probably slightly increased.”

Executives at Mark Burnett Productions, the company behind “The Apprentice,” contacted Turk in July, just as she was getting ready to start the marketing campaign on her new swimwear line.

The fashion executive appeared in an episode where the show’s contestants are challenged to design swimwear and then exhibit their creations at a fashion show.

“It felt a little surreal,” Turk said of being filmed on Will Rogers State Beach with Trump. But she didn’t let the odd situation ruffle her feathers. Unlike many brands that are featured on the reality show, Turk said that her company did not pay any fee for the chance to appear on TV.

Several weeks after the screening of the episode, Turk said that she still cannot detect a significant impact on her label’s sales. “The upside is that millions of people who wouldn’t have heard of Trina Turk heard it again and again,” she said.

French-born fashion executive Christian Audigier is hoping to interest a wider audience. A representative for his Los Angeles– based company said that the designer of fashion labels Don Ed Hardy and Christian Audigier is pitching a reality TV show starring himself.

Dominick Deluca is another media-savvy fashion executive who would like to see his image on TV screens. He is the chief operating officer of the skatewear boutique chain Brooklyn Projects. It maintains three shops, with locations in the Hollywood and Echo Park neighborhoods of Los Angeles and in Hiroshima, Japan.

He is pitching a reality TV series about life at Brooklyn Projects and the skateboarders who work and shop there. Deluca worked as a veejay on MTV’s “Headbanger’s Ball” program in the early and mid-1990s. Deluca said it is ironic that he is pitching this untitled series. “They wanted me to be on the first season of [MTV’s pioneering reality show] ’The Real World.’ But I said no. I didn’t dig living with six strangers.”