This show is produced and hosted by Mark Webber. The show is sponsored by G three Aparo. I view's expressed in the following program are those of the sponsor and not necessarily the opinion of seven tenor or iHeartMedia. Who is Mark Weber. He's a self made business executive here to help you find your success, from the New York City projects to the Avenue Montaigne in Paris. His global success story in the luxury world of fashion is inspirational. He's gone from.
Clerk to CEO twice.
Mark is classic proof that the American dream is alive. And well, here's your host of Always in Fashion, Mark Weber.
Mark Weber. Trade.
That's all anybody wants to talk about right now.
And I get it.
We've all seen our net worth go down. But I've sold nothing. I believe in the companies I own. I believe that they're all well and they'll be doing well. So I haven't sold anything. I think therefore, I haven't lost money. None of you have lost money unless you're selling at a loss. And with that is a backdrop, we have to talk trade again. I can't believe it. We did it all last week. We've been doing it for a long time, but here we are. It's rational,
it's big, it's the news of the day. But it was a fascinating experience that got me to agree to do this again. The other day, I was at a children's function, a luncheon, and I happened to walk over and see two little boys are sitting on the ground. They both have baseball cards. One of them is holding an Aaron Judge card. The other one has a Shohai
Otani card. And it was amazing to watch because each one wanted the other's card, and they were talking about how they could trade, and whether or not they wanted to give up the card, whether they would be happy with the other one, And watching them discuss reminded me that fifty years ago, when I was born, I was slapped. I wanted my milk, and unless you gave me my milk, I wasn't gonna stop crying. We were negotiating, we were trading. I think about myself when I had trading cards in baseball.
I wanted Mickey Manner. The other guy had Willie Mays. There's always been training. If little kids could do it, and they understand, don't you think the rest of us should be able to every time we walk into a restaurant, every time you walk into a clothing store, buy something. Every store you buy, anywhere anywhere you go is service, and it's a trade. I buy gas, it's a trade. You're offered services. You could accept it or not. You could pay the price or not. We're all traders. We're
all experienced traders. You don't like it, you don't buy it, you walk away. We all decide whether or not what someone's offering is worth our money. And in business, that's what all we do, is trade. What is so confusing right now, and what I'm astounded is how messed up we are and how confusing the government is this. I don't think we have to be because what they're doing I think is right. We are right now. If you've been listening to the show the last few weeks, I
am in agreement with what's happening. I believe there's a trade in balance and it can be fixed simply. I believe the tarage should be reciprocal. You tax me, I tax you make it an even number. I've been trading. I've been an international trader in negotiation for my entire career. I've been purchasing products for my adult life all over the world. I'm an expert, at least I was, and I always recognized that someone had something that I wanted
and I was willing to pay for it. Whether it was a million dollars or ten million dollars worth of products, I could buy them. And it all was based on whether or not I had a choice. It's a big world out there. I didn't have to buy from anyone in particularly, but I had a choice of who knew what they were doing, what they made, whether the products were worth the money, the quality, whether I trust that they would delivering them time, and on and on and on.
They could do anything I wanted to do, except where the government regulations were involved. The government has the right to stop trade with any country. The government has a right to assess therap. The government has a right to say we can't do business with a particular country. I don't remember now if it's still in place, but there was embargo. You couldn't buy from Miramar because their behavior in human rights. I don't know if that still exists, but I knew I couldn't go there. I couldn't do
business there. We can't do business and Cuba against the rules, so you have to work within that, and there are limitations that are put on business. China used to be unfairly treated if you consider that quotas were put on their country. They couldn't explot as much as they wanted to export until they were members of the World Trade Organization, which if I remember collectly, Bill Clinton was in office at the time that he pushed that through. Now I
understand all these limits and I worked around them. The government seemed to understand what they were doing. But we don't understand at the moment that the government has a right to make these decisions a trade and I will tell you this, this is not the first time trade has become political. It's always been about what makes the most sense for the best price wherever you want to be. But the government has always gotten involved with what we want to do. They set the rules. They have the
greatest interest involved, the strategic interests. They would establish what countries we can import from and how many items we could buy from any given country you take political Turkey has always been a friend, but a friend with a question mark. They are living two lives. They are involved with one part of the world and involved with the.
Other part of the world.
But we are NATO and they've been our allies. But keep them happy. We've always given them most favored trading status. You could take countries like Bangladesh, who's always underprivileged and always third world. We gave them extraordinary rights as they and other developing countries part of the US government's decision on what makes important. Oh, having said this, there should be no surprise where we are today. Everything that was
done was done with our eyes wide open. We sent people into China and told them we want to manufacture. We're going to teach you everything we know so you can manufacture those things what they need for our country. They stole nothing, we gave it to them. But now at a point where trade seems to be in the news and we're all confused. So I'm going to take this opportunity again a week later, a month later, a
year later, to explain it again. I stated a couple of weeks ago, and I'm going to continue with today, let's talk trade. But first let's talk what is fair trade. And here's a revelation that again I've talked about many times, there is no fair in this world. There's no fair in life. There's no fair in anything. Fair is for kids, just like tricks is for kids. It's a made up concept. Nowhere as it's said in the world that fair is fair in the Declaration of Independence, it's not anywhere to
be found in our constitution. There's no mention of the word fair. And if you ask me to give you a at home family discussion, is what's fair? I can tell you can only hope for the best.
But if my.
Sons and I live to be a thousand years old, the trade that relationship between us will never be fair. I have and will have done more for Jesse and my other son Jared, than they'll ever done for me. They cannot catch up. It's not possible. But whatever the relationship is, we've reached what we believe is a coexistence that we can get something from each other that makes sense in common sense. Unfortunately isn't so common in our familyse Jared, go to school, work hard, do the right thing,
and I will support you as a father. Treat me with respect. I will support you as a father.
All the question is can I come in Before I introduce you? I want to come in real quick. Hi, everybody, Hi, hold on, I can't sit back and hear this. All the times I help you with the printer, all the times I help you with your iPad, I have to say, that's value right there? No, I mean, my goodness.
Did you ever feed me maybe formula food?
Did you ever feed me from a bottle?
Did you ever change my diaper?
Have you ever met?
Put you to sleep at night?
Take you to games? Come on?
How could you ever catch up with that?
You can't?
I don't know.
I feel insulted. I feel like I'm a good son and I do a lot for you.
That's my son, my co host Jesse Weber. Anyway, let me just finish where I am here. Common sense is in common, but here it's showing you don't want to look at it. You don't think you've done more for me, and I've done for you great. But here's what do you want?
Is what you have to ask yourself in a nutshell? What do you want? What can you walk away from?
Whoever has the power to walk away in the end wins. And the only people I want to talk to is people that are sitting across the table from me that weren't stupid, stupid people. The worst thing you can't negotiate him because they don't know right from wrong. But in business, there is no stupid. All the people across the table from you are smart and smarter than you, and you have to be on your game in order to make
sure you're smart. Now, the only argument I ever want to get into, and the other side is in an indefensible position.
And what you're looking.
At right now, accounting for the world today and the trade policies that are put in place with our eyes wide open government to government, we don't like what we're seeing because it's indefensible the position over the years that we put ourselves in with our allies or our competitors. So Donald Trump is right for pressing the button and making this happen. There is no fare. But we could be smart, and we haven't been smart. Looking back to
how maybe we got here. During the Vietnam War, we gave special status and special trade treatment to countries that helped us in the war. If you look at the war in North and South Korea back in the fifties, we took care of the South, We defended them and helped them fight off the North. And there were reasons for it, and there are reasons they have its special trade status with US.
You could look.
Back now and decide that anything you decided in the course of history doesn't make sense in today's times. But you can't put today's head on yesterday's decisions. And that's where I think Donald Trump is wrong. It wasn't stupid people. It was expeditious decisions that were made. You can't put today's head on yesterday's decision. But our reconciliation is due, and I support Donald Trump for what he's doing, but
the execution is what's in question. All should we ask, all we should be hoping for, is they're smart.
Now.
The timetable had seamed off, but on Wednesday. On Wednesday, they realized there was no rush and they put a ninety day moratorium on just about every country in the negotiations. No tax increases success for China. However, China is our largest trading partner, and going at it with them head to head in the media is going to cause havoc. Negotiations need to take place on all of these major issues with all of our major trading partners. There's an
imbalance of trade, there's a deficit in trade. It's logical it can be addressed. The needs to be a negotiation, and I'll continue in one second.
I want to make another point.
I basically have said what I need to say. Look, it's easy to renegotiate now. It's easy to look at what was having transpired over the last ten hundred years in terms of international trade and be critical. I like to believe at the time it was intilented, it made sense for all the right reasons. Strategic business, economic partnerships developed with countries we needed as allies, we gave them specialty, whatever the reasons why, I'd like to believe is done
for the right reasons. Those agreements have been in place for far too long. The defforts have been growing far too big, and it's right that we are reclaiming the power of America. You know, we talk about NATO, which is the worst trade agreement ever made in the history of mankind according to the government, according to Donald Trump. But at the time it was put in place, it was to benefit trade on this continent between China, Mexico
and the United States. It was put in place to bring trade back to this hemisphere between these three countries without duty, without tariffs amongst them, so we could afford to buy from each other rather than China, and on top of it, we were closer to each other, so it would have improved the operations. What went wrong It was ill founded that the standard of living and many of our countries and companies is very different than even Canada or certainly Mexico, and most of the business shifted
outside the United States. So it's right to reclaim the power America.
We are a.
Huge purchasing nature, probably the largest global purchaser in the world, and with that strength and demands, we should ask for and get what we want, or more importantly, not what we want, what we need. We've got the leverage. Anytime I ever had the leverage, I knew I was going to win, they negotiate, I could walk away, they couldn't. Now's the time we need to be smart. We're fixing the timetable. The President created the opportunity to renegotiate, and
that's what he's doing. The question is are we doing it intelligently. My view, it was the timetable. Now that we're clearing that up, it seems to make sense. We can make our position clear, set a realistic timetable that allows for our businesses and infrastructure to absorb change. Change what we're doing, move it to other countries, pick new partners. We needed to fix the deadline. I'm still worried about China.
Now.
I've been talking about trade for a year. In recent shows, I laid out a plan. I can say, go back and listen. It's the forbear of what Trump and the administration's doing. They actually are doing what I said before we did it. In twenty twenty, I was on CNBC television talking Trump's war. I said, he's possibly there's not going to be a war China. I love them for what they are. They're hardcore, negotiated. They're an unlimited, low cost workforce who's highly skilled, perhaps maybe the best in
the world. Now, I'm a businessman, not a politician. I know what I need and I know what they can deliver with my help. That can manufacture great products at fair costs or if there is no such word as fair at good cost. It's perfect for my business. The politicians now are using all the leverage we have to affect change on the geopolitical landscape, and that's their job. We should be allies.
Not enemies. Now here's a tip.
This one's so simple and so stupid what we're doing. Stop disrespecting China in the media. We've made them our enemies. In the media, everyone jumps on China. Could you imagine if they did it to us and we were listening. You wouldn't like it either. You can't threaten them, You wouldn't want to be threatened. Don't put that back to the wall. You wouldn't want your back to the wall. Talk with them privately. You'll find we have common goals.
You have concerns regarding their growing military present. Okay, mister President. Build more ships, build more airplanes, invest in technology, build a military now for practically the tenth time, and if not the one hundred times again. And balance the trade.
We buy more than every other trading partner. If we're buying five hundred billion from you and you're only buying two hundred billion from me, I'm going to give you a list of those things I think you should buying from us, and I want you to work out a plan to make up the difference of the three hundred million. Now, if you tell me you're not as big a country as we are, and it's only right that we're buying
more than you, I'll listen. If you're a smaller country, I don't expect Australia to buy as much from US as we buy from them. Perhaps I'm told we import twenty billion dollars of beef from Australia. They don't buy our beef. So we've got to figure this out. And where are they going to say, you don't want to buy beef, Okay, buy something else. So China buys less from us than we buy from them, that's because they've been smarter than us. We like what they have more
than they like what we have. We should do something about it, come on, President Trump, But not in public forum, behind the scenes.
Now.
It's not China's fault now, or is it ever?
It's our fault.
We allowed this to happen. We made it very easy for them. And for years and years and years since nineteen ninety seven China went into Hong Kong. I think nineteen ninety was the start of the World Trade Organization, which freed them up to do whatever they needed to do. What have we done about it?
Nothing?
Because China at the moment is more industrialized than us.
They have a.
Manufacturing economy and mentality, and because they have an endlest of high people who work at lower wages comparable to our country and the rest of the world. They have a work ethic that's not to be believed. I used to go to Hong Kong and see them put a skyscraper up in less than a year. It would take us ten years here in the United States just for the permits, let alone building it. They get the permits, they get it done. China's people are industrios, their go
to people. They get things done, and missed the president. Let's not forget all, if not all, so much of our clothes, our shoes, our tables, our chairs, our umbrellas, whatever what not are affordable. Americans can stretch their paychecks because of the hard work of the Chinese people. Now hold that thought, I want to go to Japan. I spent so much time in Jampan. Believe that your hero here had been to Japan fifty times. I walked the
streets in Tokyo, I'd walked the streets of Osaka. I loved their culture, and I remember seeing very few Western people in Japan. Maybe they didn't like us, Maybe we just didn't feel comfortable there. I don't know what the reason, but I remember I did business there, but more relevantly, I always remember I didn't see American cars. I didn't understand it. Japanese cars were styled brilliantly, they were less expensive than American cars, and they had a reputation for excellent,
reliable quality. At the same time, you couldn't say that for American cars, although our muscle cars in particular were worldly cool. And I remember at one point General Motors came out with a new Firebird, great styling, great callers, great price, and it had a reputation for liability. And as a turn, I was at a level in the company. I was entitled to have my personal car that the company would pay in sure for me and give me
to drive as part of my compensation. And I got this Firebird and I loved it, and I remember saying to myself, why isn't this car or any other cars in Japan. So I was in Japan one day talking with some of the people I did business with, and I said, why don't you guys buy American cars? And they started to laugh politely, they're very polite, they said, when you came here General Motors, and we went to your trade fair, do you realize we drive on the
right side. You drive on the left side, and the only cars you offered for sale were right were left handed driving cars. That's not globally responsible. We're losers. We weren't thinking right. Can you imagine that we're making cars that they don't work? It doesn't make sense. I remember I wrote an email to the CEO of General Motors when I came back. I was feeling big in those days. I used to be important. As you know, I'm not
any law I said, what are we doing? I did get back a letter from someone in General Motors cycle bibble. It was an answer for a better world, but it was not the right answer. We weren't smart traders. We weren't thinking about when needed to be. Then the quality wasn't as good as the Japanese. As was a crisis. You want to blame the Japanese for making better cars than we. You want to make the Japanese for understanding we drive on the left side.
Yeah.
I don't know what has happened over the years, but she is. We needed to learn to become global. So if we didn't understand it, go to Hong Kong, go to the United's Kingdom, go to London. Mercedes figured out what to do. The Koreans figured out what to do. The Japanese figured out what to do. They drive on the right, so they bought they built cars that way. I want to go back to China. You can't blame China for having inexpensive labor versus the United States. You
can't blame them for being competitive, even more competitive. Let's get smart now, we need inexpensive products from China. Now I have to tell you China is not the inexpensive source any longer. Bangladesh, Vietnam, there are many other companies cheaper than China. But China manufactures with great skill in quantity and quality. Every one of those people and their factories are expert at it. Their manufacturing responsibilities are always well deserved. They set a price, they deliver on time,
and the product is right. And don't forget for a minute, our economy needs a low price. A huge, huge part of the Americ consumer's requirement is prices that are affordable. I can tell you right now that the current procedures in going in place in the trade negotiation and public forum. If we don't fix this with China, it's going to destroy luxury retail and whostsale in the United States. Most of are sneakers. Think about that, you're all wearing sneakers.
Most of them are coming from China, and at prices people want to pay. If I said it, China is no longer the low cost producing country. They're skilled and reliable with prices that make sense. We do not have alternatives at the moment and the quantities and the scope of business that exist with the United States and China to make t shirt, to make shoes, and we don't want to make those goods.
We're paying people in the.
United States a different standard of levering. We don't want to make minimum wage t shirts. We have to make in computers, we want our people making computer chips. We want them making iPhones. We wanted to make cars. We want them to make a decent wage in this country, making twenty dollars an hour for products that command the higher price because they may command higher skills. We need this for our workers. You can't tell me that artificial intelligence or robots are going to be able to build
and make those products competitively. And if they are, how long from now?
We can't wait.
Miss the President exclude a peril and footwear from these tariffs, particularly in China, or extend the deadline with China on these categories for the hundred times balance the trade. Here's the solution. Give them a list of what we want them to buy, let them work on it. They'll come back to this reciprocal trade. Very simple solution. Also add up all the protection of tariffs that are being put
in place on merchandise and products. So you want to sell them to these individual companies and look at what are collective protection of tariffs and then either eliminate them, which I don't think is possibly because unless you ait a vath tax or consumption sax, we make the money tons of millions and trillions of dollars from these taxing products that are coming into this country. So if you
take them all to reciprocal, that's the first win. If not match it exactly and then figure out another way of taxing. Now, the answer to these issues is common sense. No one can argue against this policy. In conclusion, I support the president. They're finally doing what needs to be done. They're extending the timetable, so it's not immediate. Yes and no, I've said what makes sense to do the timetable is a massive problem, but it's being fixed. Change it with China.
Extend the deadlines, please, and stop negotiating with China through the media. Talk to them face to face. Chairman. She and Donald Trump are both very tough guys.
We get it.
You both have strong personalities.
We get it.
You both want to do what's best for your country. We get it. You don't hang your laundry out. Never let anyone outside the family know what you're thinking, Mikey Coleone said, face to face. Quietly, having said this, I'll now reintroduce my son, my co host, my lawyer, Jesse Webber.
Hey, yess, you make a very good argument. I like it.
I like it.
I like it.
I like it.
We're kind of in an unpredictable territory right now with everything. You know. One of the things I think that's interesting that you haven't addressed is the reaction. So I got to tell you we were in a position where Donald Trump supporters, whether those are media figures, financial people, congressional members,
they would support him through anything. But when it comes to the wallet, when it comes to the economy, when it comes to the piggy bank, I think it is fascinating to see them turning on him and questioning him. And I wonder whether or not that influenced him for the ninety day pause, because what do you see On the other side, there are those who say, oh, you know,
just give it time, see what happens. This is a negotiating tool that I've seen commentators even suggest the really ones who will support him throughout anything, it's not a big deal to lose money. Hey, you lose money, It's fine. That's what life's all about.
I don't know.
I don't look at my four oh one ks, I don't look at my stock market. Really, that's that's the answer. So I think it's something to be said that even the people who are art in Trump supporters are very concerned about what he's doing. I haven't seen anything like that before. For all the things that President Trump has done, even when he's president, when he wasn't president, that are questionable, this is the thing that you've seen people turn on him for. Isn't that interesting to see?
Well, I'd stop by saying behind anyone with vision, they're fifty well intentioned people undermining that vision. Now, the currncern I've had from day one on all of this was the timetable. As I said earlier, if you're going to negotiate trade agreements with one hundred different countries, seventy of them have pointed out that they're ready. It takes time to agree on what to gree By extending the timelines,
he's going to be proven to be right. We're going to win far more than we're going to lose, and we're going to straighten out this country. Now, we should take a porse to take a big breath. If we do the same thing with China, all it takes is one phone call privately and both parties say we came to an agreement to wait ninety days. This maniacal paranoia will change. The stock market will go back. I said it again earlier. I own Apple stock. There's nothing going
on here that's gonna change Apple's future. They're gonna have a blip, of course, they'll go up for a little while. They'll come back to normal over time. So Trump has a plan. They haven't done a good job of sharing it. All they've done is shown their bravado by the adjustment to ninety days on Wednesday, big, big, big difference. And we'll see on my belief the stock market will rebound. I've said all along, cool heads have to prevail.
There's a logic to this. There's a logic.
If I'm buying ten dollars from you, I want you to buy ten dollars from me, or explain to me why you can't. If I'm buying one hundred billion dollars worth of product from you and you're buying ten billion dollars for me, that's a big difference. And if you can't buy as much as me, I would like to know why. But if you're only going to do that, there's a problem. You could do a lot better. I will give you a list of industries that you can buy from. You know, the companies come in and do better,
and that negotiation, believe me, is going to work. And believe me, I couldn't wait to see what happened to the stock market once this did it, and then it's going to improve even more so, so I'm good with it. And again I go back to what I said, Jesse. Any time I've ever had a great idea, the nicest people, the smartest people fought me all the way always. I'll give you a great example. You know, back in van
using days. I recognize that I wanted to spend a lot of money advertising men's stress shirts because it was the biggest business in the company, and we put a substantial budget behind advertising men's stress shirt. And the interesting thing is one year, one season, I decided to put all my money in women's magazines, men's dress shirt and women's magazines. Now everybody said, what are you crazy where we're selling men's shirts, And I said to him, you know,
here's the thing. Men know who we are. Men walk into stores. We're all over the stores. We have big presentations. They're going to see us. The best form of advertising is shelf space, and we have it. But women are influential and purchasing of men's shirts. They're influencing seventy percent of all the purchasing of men's shirts, whether through their children, whether they're their significant others, whether through their husbands. They
are making decisions. Everyone fought me year that year, Marketing Age Many made me award of one of the top one hundred marketing people in the country for doing that, and our business grew dramatically and we established ourselves with women. But everyone fought me tooth and nail when I wanted to put a billboard up in Yankee Stadium.
What are you doing?
Nobody cares about baseball? What? Three million visitors a year, all the TV coverage winning the World Series, Men, Women Global, everyone watched the New York Yankees.
Everyone came.
I had people from LVMH, the President on down sitting front row and New York Yankees and they've never even been to a ballgame. And everyone in the company dk WY at the time fort me and to this day, I haven't been in that company for ten years.
They have a.
Bigger billboard in Yankee Stadium. So that's what's happening here. And I think the President has to take the heat, but he and his staff have to be smart. And now that they put a timetable change in, I've said all I want to say. I am tired of talking trade, but I am hoping now two weeks in a row, under great stress, definitions and explanations of what we need to think about. I've made my pitch to the president. Cool heads need to prevail. We're going to take a break.
Tonight's show is entitled I'll Trade You, We come back. We'll do some more trading, but slightly different.
Always in fashion.
I spent a lifetime of my career building the van Usen brand, and I am so pleased that they're back with us now talking about suits. Men were dressing up again, and it's become cool to wear a suit. Suits can be won on multiple occasions, in multiple ways. You could wear a suit formally to go out at night or to an event. You can wear a suit to the office with or without a tie. If you look closely, now fashion trends, suits are being worn with turtlenecks or
mark next. The choices are endless and every one of them looks right. You could really really look the part. I believe that packaging yourself is as important does the products you package, and wearing a suit is one of those things that make men look their best. Venuesn't invented a new idea. It's called the cool flex suit. It's been engineered with stretch technology, giving you the most comfortable fit and mobility. It's wrinkle resistant fabric, it's cool moisture wiki.
It makes it perfect for all occasions. As we discussed just now, this new style of looking sharp while feeling cool and comfortable is amazing, and I'm so excited that the van Using company is involved in this new technology and is embracing the whole idea.
Of dressing up.
Let's not forget van Usen made it's name with dress shirts. It's only proper that the suit business follows strongly in its way. You can find van Using Kolflex Men's stretch suits at jcpenny or online at jcpenny dot com. Guys, they're great, you should go look at them. Donna Karen began her career as one of the finest, most successful,
powerful women in the fashion industry. She developed a collection aimed at the luxury market for women on the go, women who were powerful in their workplace, women who had lives that extended beyond the workplace, and her clothes went from day and tonight. An extraordinary collection. But the interesting thing Donna Karen had a young daughter and she had friends and they couldn't afford to buy the Donna Karen collection, and Donna invented dk n Y Donna Karen New York.
It's an offshoot of the Donna Karen collection. The same concept a lifestyle brand. Then we talk about lifestyle brands, what does that really mean? Simply what they say, there are brands that follow you throughout your lifestyle. You get up in the morning, you start to get dressed Donna Karen dcan why as intimate apparel, as hosiery, as all those products. You're getting dressed for work. You get accessorized shoes, handbags,
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Welcome back to it was in fashion. Here's your host, Mark Webber.
When I was a little boy and I had trading cards, baseball cards, that's what they were called. I had a card, somebody else had another card I wanted. I agreed to give up something. I had to get it in return. Every one of us has been a tradesman. We've all traded, We've all negotiated. Men, women, every age, every size, every shape.
We trade.
Every day we walk into a restaurant. We're making a decision to purchase food in a restaurant and pay for it with our money. We consider it a good trade because we're getting value in exchange. I don't care what it is you go into buy gasoline. You need gasoline, you buy gasoline. We've talked about trade, and that's what
tonight's show is now. Having said that, the lot goes into this a lot of legalities and my son, my co host, my fellow trader, Jesse Weber, Jesse My got what's been going on with Trump in the world right now.
So if you talk about tariffs, I think it presents a very interesting legal question because you're already seeing proposed lawsuits regarding the tariff's current lawsuits, and one of the main issues is does the president have the power to impose these tariffs, because generally speaking, that's yes, it's the president.
Yes, it's the president.
No, it's the purview of Congress. Congress has the power to regulate trade. Congress has the power to impose tariffs. Now, the president could say, I have the authority under a specific federal law. It's called the International Emergency Economic Powers of nineteen seventy seven, And his argument would be that under this law, when there is a national crisis, a national emergency, the president can regulate international commerce. So what's the emergency, Well, the flow of fentanyl, the flow of
drugs into the country. I can use tariffs as a bargaining chip to stop something like that. Ah feels like a little bit of a stretch. And by the way, I don't think the Supreme Court would support him on this. There's been commentary that would suggest that it would be a nine to zero decision that what he's doing could be unconstitutional and illegal. And I think that that is a very interesting position to be in. We talk about whether or not he would get he's not getting the
support that he wants universal support for the tariffs. He might not get support in the courts.
What do you think about it?
Wasn't there's something else with the strategic country's well being dating back to the seventeen hundreds or something.
Well, let me just say. The other argument that I would say is they could say, over time, Congress has relinquished some of its power regarding tariffs to the president. But the counter argument to that would be that you really need Congress outright make it clear we are giving up our authority to the president when it comes to tariffs, and they haven't done that. So I think he's in and I think that that's what presents a little bit
of controversy for the president. So anyway, that's what's going on with the tarwer and the courts?
Well, how could the president then go so far if there's a chance that Congress could step in?
Oh I'm sorry, Where have you been the last few months? Have we not seen the president trying every which way to see how far his authority goes and to see if the courts will stop him from deportations, the firing probationary workers to now the tariffs. Look, I don't blame Donald Trump and the administration for trying to do what they want to do, but you can't blame the courts for stepping in and saying you're not following the law. But he has the right to try to go as
far as he can. He's just getting stopped. He's really putting the limits on presidential authority and executive authority. I think it's a very interesting time to have a legal analysis.
Are any Republican congressman trying to stop him when it comes to tariffs?
're seeing a little bit of pushback, just.
A little bit.
So this is another example where the Democrats are on the wrong side of offense.
Ted Cruz, okay, Ted Cruz, who, by the way, this is Donald Trump used to make fun of Ted Cruz made fun of his wife. He's a supporter of the president nonetheless. But even now, when it comes to the tariffs, he's saying, either this will be a great bargaining chip to get the other countries to come forward and negotiate good trade deals. But he's pushed back and said, I don't know how good these things are. It's so funny. He never went back against the president despite all that.
But when it comes to tariffs, when it comes to the economy, when it comes to your wallet, that's where you see pushback.
Well, okay, it only leads me into a subject. I think, as I said, behind anyone with vision, they're fifty well intentioned people undermining that vision. I think the president is being brilliant. I think he's got balls as big as an elephant. And I don't think he's afraid of doing anything. No, I only pray. I have my fingers crossed. I don't like looking at my four oh one k. I don't like looking at anything. I don't like looking at any statements.
What's going on from from financial point of view. But if they calm down and do it smart, and do their homework and handle it properly, I have great faith in the decisions that have being made, except for China publicly. Now, what's saying that I want to talk about what's in my life? I was brilliant, Jesse. You think I'm brilliant more than once in my life.
I would say so, even though you don't give yourself enough credit.
Oh, thank you for that. You're usually hounding me.
Well, what have I ever said? You're not brilliant, you're not smart?
Well, thank you. I really appreciate that. I used to be important, you know, I would think, oh, well, my son saying I'm brom lost for words. Thank you, which brings me to Have you seen the Bob Dylan interview on sixty minutes from the year two thousand and four. No, well, he was interviewed, of course because the movie A Complete Unknown Coming Out was interviewed, and in very awful terms. The moderator from sixty minutes asked him, how did you
write those songs? They were so brilliant, and he said, and he thought about it, and he took a pause and he said, I don't know. All I can tell you was it was magical. And he said, not the Siegfried and Roy kind of magical. It was something between me and the world that these words came into my mind and I wrote these songs. And the guy said, it's brilliant. Can you do it again? And he said, I wouldn't want to even try to sit down because I know I can't do it again. And he said
to him, how does that make you feel? He said, well, I know I did it once and I could do something else, which speaks to me because we're talking about trade, and I want to tell you that once in my life was brilliant. I was working for van Usin at the time, and the entire textile industry in the United States didn't make sense. They put the emphasis on the suppliers and not the end users. There were huge textile mills making the fabric that controlled everything, and they said
all the rules. They would tell you how much to buy, what you'd pay for it. You had no other alternative because it was all in the United States. I won't say all the mills were hoots with each other, but the prices were all the same. The quantities they made you buy created surplus. It was not a good environment. And I was brought into the dress shirt business watching this, and I watched it for about a week ten days, and I said, there's no way you can sustain this.
This makes no sense. And at the time when I was watching it, there were people who were middlemen. They were called agents entrepreneurs who would go to Japan, Taiwan, and Korea and offer alternatives to companies like myself to buy fabric at lower prices and less quantities and better quality. Just think about what these you wanted at a lower price and better quality. And we didn't know anything about it,
and we started to buy from them. Let's just say, without going into the long story, I realized that there was a world outside the United States and textile that we didn't know and we needed to explore. And I went to my boss at the time, vice president and general manager, said, I want to go to Asia. I think we could do better. I now know where all these mills are. We know what they're doing. Why do we need a middleman to go and do this for us? And he said, let me get back to you, and
he went to the president of the company. The president of the company agreed that we could make a trip that based on our explanation and based on the surpluses we were creating, and based upon the fact that the world was changing, fashion and dreasure and church in general was exploding, and we were being limited by a small choice of ideas in the United States. And they sent us on a way, and I went to Asian, and I realized in Asian that there was a better mouth,
there was a better way to do this. And I learned textiles from the ground up. I knew everything about the yarn, how you weave, how many machines you need to get the quantities you need, how long it takes, what the prices should be. I understood that if a pattern a shirt pattern was mostly white with a black stripe, in behalf the price of a mostly black shirt with a white stripe. I learned everything that was to know, and I became I kid you, not even at my
young age. I was younger than you, Jesse. I was one of the pre eminent, if not the most, knowledgeable man in the United States about purchasing textiles overseas.
I was brilliant.
If you ask me like you asked Bob Dylan today, if you asked me, can I do this again? I don't think so. I don't know how. At twenty six years old, I figured this all out, but I did, and I thought, being that we're trading and we're talking about trade, I wanted to share some of the lessons I learned along the way because I was drawn to a And here's some of the keys to being a smart trade negotiated. First of all, you have to be thorough. You have to know what all the options are. So
the negotiator is right now with Donald Trump's group. If you're going to take us out of China, where am I going to make my sneakers? Vulcanized shoes, that's what they're called. You know, the bottoms of sneakers are attached with glue and under high pressure and heat. Very few countries have this expertise. So where are we going to get all those sneakers wh're not there's a problem. So if Donald Trump and team want to close off China, what are they going to do close off the sneaker business?
It's one of the hottest, most important businesses in this country and around the world. So you one, you have to be thorough. Number two, you have to be smart. If you're going to make a decision, you have to make sure you're making the right You always have to be clever. If Donald Trump and company came to us and said, hey, you no longer can make sneakers in China, but we've found out that bank, the Desh has the ability to make five million pair a day.
You go there.
We've already talked to Bangladesh. We're to give them special treatment. So you have to be clever negotiation. You have to be nice. You have to always have a smile on your face. It's not personal, it's business. And you have to be at the same time very tough. And you have to know what's the difference between those two. You could smile and still be tough. What you need is to know what you need, not what you want, and what do you want? You have to understand the negotiation
if you have the ability to walk away. That goes back to being thorough. If I go to five different countries and I know all of them make the product I'm interested in, and the country that I selected to do the business with, or the company I selected to do the business with is not treating me the way I want to be treated. There are ten other companies in that country I could go to, or there are ten other countries. If you know the market and you've
been thorough, you can walk away. Now. You always need options, You always need to know what your choices are, and you have them because.
You were thorough.
I want to tell you how I would organize a trip to buy textiles or buy anything for that matter, overseas. The first decision you make is based on your knowledge, based on the products you want to acquire, which countries, which cities, which companies have the ability to make your product, and you lay it out. In my case, the choice is just to give you a few well, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Malaysia, and Japan. And on my first swing through, that's what
I would do. I would have probably one hundred to two hundred items that I needed to purchase, and the value of those purchases in my early days was about twenty five million dollars, which in turn represented about one hundred and fifty to two hundred million dollars worth of product and department stores. I would visit all of these cities and all the companies that I thought made sense.
On my swing through, I visited the suppliers. And here's the best thing I learned learn from each meeting you have you walk into your first meeting and somebody says to you, you know where the best Oxford shirt fabric in the world is made. It's made in China. Now I can't tell you that they can export it on time. I don't know enough about their business. Let's say I'm sitting in Japan, but that Oxford is great, and the
twenty cents a yard cheaper than me. I could charge you a dollar twenty They'll charge it up the next meeting I'm going to. I sit in the meeting and said, what do you know about Oxford? Where would you buy Oxford if you and me? And sure enough I already learned about China. I would visit all my suppliers. I would learn as you go along, and each meeting I would regroup, and every time I went, I would go along my swing to all the companies. I'd spend a week all the cities, and I would sit and then
I grew group in Hong Kong. In Hong Kong, I would sit down and look at everything I learned and then determine where, in fact I would go back to execute. I always knew that if my plan wasn't going to work and I wanted to buy something in Japan at factory number one. If they said no, I knew the other factories in Japan. If Japan was insistent, then I would go to Taiwan. So I had a back door, I had an exit. I knew what I want. That's the way you negotiate from strength.
Having have it.
Now, I want to change the subject just a bit, because every one of us is aware of country of origin. Where do you want to make products? Well, if it was up to me today, with the momentum and the United States, I'd make everything in the United States. Let's assume for the moment I could, everything would be a lot more expensive. When it comes to the products I'm talking about, footwear, accessories, apparel just too expensive. Now, what I've learned is only in luxury are people willing to
pay for where it's made. In fact, if you're buying a handbag feetne for three thousand dollars or more for that matter, if it's not made in Paris or somewhere in Italy, nobody's gonna buy it. They don't want to see made in China. Why are they seeing made in China for luxury goods? They'll pay for it, but they expect that in turn. Now, did you know made in Italy? Here's where it gets tricky. While the label doesn't say well, let's say it this way. The label made in Italy
says made in Italy. Did you know that Milan, one of the great manufacturing centers of Italy, is really made in Italy by Chinese workers. There's one hundred thousand Chinese workers trained in China living in Italy making those products that are.
Made in it.
Even Laura piano wool can be products shipped to China made in China. So everything is different. America nice to have, but people won't pay for it. I learned that the hard way over the line, Jesse, I have a question for you. You see your shirt you like? One is in Gap and one is American Eagle. They have the same shirt. The American Eagle shirt is fifteen dollars, the one in Gap is ten. Which one are you buying?
Ten? Exactly?
Why you don't want to pay five thousand?
Made in America? You know, exactly?
It's interesting.
It's interesting.
I would pause maybe if I would do it, but in the end of the day, I probably just want to pay the cheaper price.
Walmart, the largest retail in the world sells great product at fair great product at low price. Do you think they're willing to buy products that are made in America if they have to raise their prices above the comfort level?
No way.
One of the companies I was responsible for back in my day with LVMH was Thomas Pink Shirts of German Street, great London shirt manufacturer.
They were on.
German Street in London, which was the high street that was responsible for all the custom made suits with Tsavo Row all the custom made shirts, brilliant shopping area, beautiful British made shirts. When I got there, everything was made in the UK. He didn't last for long because new competitors came out.
Jesse.
What's the name of the stores The British shirt meger is in every.
Mall now Charles de Witt.
Yes, that guy came out and under cut Thomas Pink by fifty dollars a shirt. Our shirts were two hundred. They were selling them for one fifty. Then they came out with four for two hundred. We had a price stresses. So Thomas Pink started manufacturing in London in the UK by importing fabric from China and Japan, and they started to do it, but it wasn't enough, the margins weren't good enough, et cetera, et cetera. Eventually, Thomas Pink made
all the shirts in Asia. Nobody cared. They loved the fashion, they love what it looked like. But here was the key, and here's our business in a nutshell quality with no surprises. I have a surprise for you, though, do you know? I want you to guess. Do you know twenty years ago, who had the highest quality standards of any one in the world in their retail store?
Take a guest, I don't know.
Take a guess who'd you think as the highest quality in any store you could ever imagine.
Twenty years ago in the fashion apparel space, Yeah, h Macy's j C.
Penny. J C.
Penny was a national chain. They had the highest and rigorous quality controls standards of anyone in the country. They had more people in Asia examining your products being made than you had yourself. They set the standard, They told us what we had to do. They forced us to be better. I got another surprise for you. Of all the countries in the world, who makes the best products? What do you mean, best, best quality, most attention to detail, Italy, China,
really China. Every country in the world, every company in the world went into China, who was backward at the time, who didn't know how to make products for export. They knew how to make products for their own country. They didn't know how the standards of the world were. So we went in. We taught them everything. What do you think Apple did when it came to iPhones. Do you think if China didn't make the best quality, Apple would be making all their iPhones or most of them there.
China's quality is unbelievable. As I said before, they don't necessarily have the lowest price, but they do have one of the greatest qualities in the world. And why what I said we need to do. We need to bring phone making smartphones back to the United States because it's highly skilled labor. You could afford to pay more to make them. If you're selling iPhones for thirteen hundred dollars when it costs twenty dollars to make Believe me, you
can pay people so these things and more. You know what kind of buttons you use, how it's sewn, Is this fabric strong? And if you ever wear a shirt and you bend your arm in a you tear it in the elbow. Yes, that's because whoever made that shirt doesn't understand bert strength. There's an technicality and a machine that measures the burst strength of a fabric bu rst. If you don't know that, you're never going to get
in control. Every single color when it's manufactured needs to be finished in a certain way so the colors don't end up being on your couch. I have used the nicest buttons, mother of pearl buttons that you need to fish and wildlife, because they are from oysters or whatever. You need approval, you need to test them. Can't be destroying oysters. They're the first that break in club pressing in the laundry, and the ugliest buttons are the ones
that you'll never break. So it's funny about buttons. Then the question is iron versus non iron? You care if your shirts are non iron versus irony?
I mean saves me time?
So do you buy cotton shirts that don't need to be pressed or you buy shirts that have to go out to be pressed?
I mean most of my shirts I have to be pressed.
There you go.
There's a reason because one hundred percent cotton without a permanent press finish is a better quality. And then, of course, my greatest kick is polyester. It used to be the most uncomfortable product.
In the world.
At one point in time. If you were wearing polyesters like wearing the devil. Everyone in the world hated it. Polyester. And all these synthetic fabrics have reinvented themselves and they're now seen as the most comfortable fabric, the ones that breathe, the best ones.
Really they don't.
They're in every pair of yoga pants, every golf shirt, and now all of a sudden, it's the greatest quality.
In the world.
So this was an intellectual show this evening. Generally, this is a business show. I've tried so hard to make it a business show, but no matter what I do, Apple, Spotify, the likes of them have categorized this cultural and lifestyle. I left the culture and lifestyle out. Tonight was a serious show about tariff's trade, quality products and the things
you need to think about negotiation. I am drained on the whole subject of tariffs and trade, and in closing, I'll say it again for the tenth time, please stop fighting with China in the media. You can say anything you want to them. In private, with respect, treat somebody, Treat others as you want them to treat you. China can be reason with. They're smart, they're intellectual, they're capable,
and they're proud. So are We talk to them privately and basically speaking, I taught you how to trade tonight, and I'd love to trade you. I'll trade you good night.