S05.E08: Faded Royalty

[Thrifty]

Quote

Marcus helps a disorganized New York City fashion designer with unpaid loans and an understaffed store.

[Thrifty]

Another damn fashion business.  GROAN.  And that beard.  Every time I see a man with a big long filthy beard like that, I just want to knock him unconscious and shave it off. 

Yeah, I know my forum avatar has a beard, but that's a cartoon representation of my avatar in an online RPG.  In real life I am clean shaven.

[Thrifty]

"You realize that this is a tax return, not a financial statement?  You know the difference?"

 

Best Marcus line on The Profit ever.  Normally I hate this semantic game of rephrasing declarative statements as questions, because it always sounds condescending.  But I had to LOL at this.  Plus, the guy is a pretty big dope.

[Thrifty]

Kind of an average episode.  The owner was irresponsible and a flake.  He fell into this classic trap of "turn what you love into a business, your passion will drive success".  People do this without having much business sense.  It's very common with restaurants where people think that just because they love to eat, and they love to cook some narrow band of foods, that they can run a successful restaurant.

 

So I can't see this being a long term success.  Marcus had to expend a lot of effort to keep this guy on track.  What happens now that Marcus isn't there?

[ae2]

This is another one where I just can't see how the business makes any true financial sense for Marcus. Its only value seems to be rooted in the show. Sure it fits within his broader fashion holdings, but it seems like there are easier ways to get there.

Who were the business owners he demoed the new clothing line to? I missed part of their intro, and I thought that the little popover said they owned sports apparel stores, but that doesn't really make sense with the style of clothing.

[cooksdelight]

The business owners he had view this guy’s stuff were the people who had the paddleboard shop with a lot of clothes in the other half of the building. I think. They sort of all run together after a while.

This guy doesn’t listen. And he is in love with the idea of being a fashion designer, but doesn’t have the head for taking care of expenses. I see this as one of those investments that Marcus is later shaking his head about.

[seacliffsal]

For me the red flag would be that the designer/owner doesn't even attempt to pay his own way.  More ideas and costs?  Great, Joe will pay.  Life style costs?  Great, girlfriend will pay.  Notice he hated the idea of a sidewalk sale until his girlfriend showed up and he was totally on it.  My opinion is that he didn't want to endanger his life style so he faked the support for the sidewalk sale to appease his girlfriend.  Because he never faced consequences for his lack of financial responsibility meant he never had to change.  "I keep all the numbers in my head."  Sure you do.  Oh, of course he is too hip and too cool to have to follow stoggy old-fashioned business practices.  He even called himself a disrupter at one point.  Please, grow up.

But, bad on Marcus for feeding into this guy's self-perception and image.  Marcus seems to so badly want to be perceived as hip that he is investing in questionable businesses.  I never heard Marcus say so many "my man" and "bro" as I did in this episode.  Marcus, there is no shame in being perceived as a bit nerdy highly successful business person.  In fact, it is very appealing to many, many people.  Fake hipness is not appealing.

[atlantaloves]

Oh WOW,  you totally nailed it Seacliff, that's what Marcus was trying to do.  (be hip that is, don't even try my friend) I don't know why, but I just adore that Marcus, I think he is adorable. He just seems like a sweetheart to me. But boy, he will lose money on this investment, mark my words, that idiotic looking flake has no idea how to do anything, and will go back to his old ways without Marcus. You are right on the money, that designer is a worthless free loader. I would like to bitch slap him. 

[Gregg247]

Marcus spent so much time trying to get Rocco to write down and focus on his plan, that Marcus neglected to tell us what his (Marcus') plan was.  How did Marcus plan on getting back his $150k investment?  How much profit was he hoping to get from it?  How would he "take it national", which is something he seems to want to do with every other business he gets involved in?  How does this business align with all his other fashion businesses?  I noticed that we didn't get any helpful graphics showing Marcus' plan for developing Rocco's business during his TH segments.  I foresee Marcus making literally tens of dollars a year off of this company.

I think Marcus needs to focus a little more and maybe write down HIS business plan!

Marcus has a partnership with that NY designer, Susanna something, who had the overbearing family.  I thought he'd maybe bring her in to critique Rocco's designs and give Marcus some guidance in regards to the fashions. 

[seacliffsal]

I think what Marcus also (purposefully) overlooked was when he asked Rocco where he got his inspiration, Rocco said that he looked at what people were wearing and combined those elements together.  So, his designing process is ripping off other designs that were already being manufactured and sold.  He is so behind the curve with that.  Nothing original nor unique.  I don't really understand why Marcus so desperately wanted this business as I see nothing but red flags.

[stormy]

I don't get it. You want to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars in a hat a T shirt business? This was a hot mess.

[KHenry14]

I don't get what Marcus sees in this guy. Even if you give him the mad genius designer label....he has no hope of actually running the business properly.  It's not a business by just coming up with designs...you need to market the business, you need to keep track of inventory, you need to manage your finances. Does anyone think he can do any of this stuff?

[cooksdelight]

18 hours ago, Gregg247 said:

I think Marcus needs to focus a little more and maybe write down HIS business plan!

He doesn’t have one for this guy. I think by the time they’d already filmed a lot of footage, Marcus finally read the handwriting on the wall. That’s why the ending seemed so abrupt. This will be one of his “misses” when he does another recap show.

[attica]

Lord, grant me the serene confidence of a mediocre white dude with a beard.  Yeesh. 

23 hours ago, seacliffsal said:

For me the red flag would be that the designer/owner doesn't even attempt to pay his own way.  More ideas and costs?  Great, Joe will pay.  Life style costs?  Great, girlfriend will pay. 

So true. I wonder if he was waiting for Marcus to offer to buy the damn engagement ring. Or maybe he expects gf to pay for that too!

The problem with hipster fashion is that it, by very definition, can't scale. Once it's in department stores, no one will want it anymore. Once hipsters see normies sporting a retro bowling shirt with a Nehru collar (srlsly? whatev), they'll move on to something else. Which is different, I think, from skaterboy fashion. That target demo gets replenished every year with brand new kids.

[qtpye]

On a shallow note...the dry nasty looking beard grossed me out.

[cooksdelight]

When he thought bomber jackets were old news, that’s when Marcus should have walked away.

[stormy]

Yep. Marcus is no fashionista but he has several clothing companies of different types that he's been successful with.

[Showthyme]

I am in the minority because I liked the clothes but not necessarily the fabric choices. Rocco is a hot mess and I don't see how anyone could work with him for very long. Marcus will buy him out or do something to make him go away.

Marcus chooses some of these failing businesses because he can get them for pennies on the dollar and the owners are not going to challenge his authority in any way. Many of these owners have dependent personalities like Rocco. It would drive me batty but I think that Marcus likes it. 

[Jamoche]

I saw patterned men's shirts at the mall today and they weren't that different from what I saw in the show. Not that I looked all that closely at either of them.

[TVbitch]

When Marcus and the dude were at the fabric store and Marcus was trying to persuade him to buy that one small dot fabric saying "Is this edgy?" And the guy was like, "I can make it edgy!" It looks to me like the guy was wearing a shirt made out of that very fabric! Shenanigans?

[Amarsir]

I agree with everything here, and yet I still liked Rocco better than the DiLascia guy. It wouldn't surprise me if they both end the same way though. (Shutting down for a loss.)

[qtpye]

On 1/25/2018 at 9:54 AM, attica said:

Lord, grant me the serene confidence of a mediocre white dude with a beard.  Yeesh. 

So true. I wonder if he was waiting for Marcus to offer to buy the damn engagement ring. Or maybe he expects gf to pay for that too!

The problem with hipster fashion is that it, by very definition, can't scale. Once it's in department stores, no one will want it anymore. Once hipsters see normies sporting a retro bowling shirt with a Nehru collar (srlsly? whatev), they'll move on to something else. Which is different, I think, from skaterboy fashion. That target demo gets replenished every year with brand new kids.

 

On 1/24/2018 at 11:23 AM, atlantaloves said:

Oh WOW,  you totally nailed it Seacliff, that's what Marcus was trying to do.  (be hip that is, don't even try my friend) I don't know why, but I just adore that Marcus, I think he is adorable. He just seems like a sweetheart to me. But boy, he will lose money on this investment, mark my words, that idiotic looking flake has no idea how to do anything, and will go back to his old ways without Marcus. You are right on the money, that designer is a worthless free loader. I would like to bitch slap him. 

 

On 1/24/2018 at 10:40 AM, seacliffsal said:

For me the red flag would be that the designer/owner doesn't even attempt to pay his own way.  More ideas and costs?  Great, Joe will pay.  Life style costs?  Great, girlfriend will pay.  Notice he hated the idea of a sidewalk sale until his girlfriend showed up and he was totally on it.  My opinion is that he didn't want to endanger his life style so he faked the support for the sidewalk sale to appease his girlfriend.  Because he never faced consequences for his lack of financial responsibility meant he never had to change.  "I keep all the numbers in my head."  Sure you do.  Oh, of course he is too hip and too cool to have to follow stoggy old-fashioned business practices.  He even called himself a disrupter at one point.  Please, grow up.

But, bad on Marcus for feeding into this guy's self-perception and image.  Marcus seems to so badly want to be perceived as hip that he is investing in questionable businesses.  I never heard Marcus say so many "my man" and "bro" as I did in this episode.  Marcus, there is no shame in being perceived as a bit nerdy highly successful business person.  In fact, it is very appealing to many, many people.  Fake hipness is not appealing.

Something about the guy reminds me of the type of person who will totally live off his girlfriend and then dump her the minute he makes it big.

[TVbitch]

I was thinking the same thing @qtpye. When Marcus kept pushing Rocco to GET THE RING!! I was like, oh please, if this dude starts making some cash from this, he will spend it on himself and will jettison the girlfriend. Also was surprised that Marcus fought so hard to significantly reduce the ownership percentage of the other guy Rocco was sponging off of. To take him from 40 to 10 was pretty drastic for someone who basically financed everything Rocco had done up until then. 

[Amarsir]

On 1/30/2018 at 1:06 PM, TVbitch said:

 Also was surprised that Marcus fought so hard to significantly reduce the ownership percentage of the other guy Rocco was sponging off of. To take him from 40 to 10 was pretty drastic for someone who basically financed everything Rocco had done up until then. 

I actually think Joe's deal was quite decent. He started at 25%, not 40. Marcus bought in for half, which would reduce Rocco and Joe to 37.5 / 12.5%. But Joe got 30% of his capital back and only lost an additional 20% of his equity.  Considering that passive investors have never come out of deals with Marcus particularly well, I wouldn't complain about that one.

[sarthaz]

A great drinking game would revolve around Marcus contradicting himself.

1) There's no way there's $40,000 in inventory in here. 

(later)  We need to sell these $32,500 in hats.

2) You need a vision for your company built around the Grandpa shirt.  You can't just run around making things that you think look cool if they don't fit your core vision

(later)  These wacky camouflage patterns are the bomb, my man. Bro-hug!

[hatchetgirl]

Bah - this idiot.  

I do like the Grandfather shirt but it is no different than Ben Sherman, Munsingwear or Fred Perry. 

I think he's off on his demographic. He should be aiming at the old mod kids who've grown up - 35 to 55.