Suiting Up for the Weekend

Ask Bob Sherinian, co-owner and manager of the 3 Day Suit Broker, what he does the four days of the week when his store is closed and he has a standard answer: “Go fishing.”

Don’t you believe it. Monday through Thursday he’s working, often late into the night, to replenish his inventory and ready his men’s clothing store for Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Operating only on extended weekends, traditionally the busiest sales period of the week, is the latest tactic for outwitting the recession. Sherinian figures that by staying open three days a week, he can beat the prices of retailers who keep their doors open on days (and nights) when business is slow.

To cut costs even further, 3 Day Suit Broker runs a bare-bones, serve-yourself operation. Instead of high-pressure sales representatives working on commission, there’s a skeletal crew of employees who wear sweat shirts instead of three-piece suits.

“We got rid of all the frills,” Sherinian says.

To avoid the high rent charged by some malls, 3 Day Suit Broker set up shop in an industrial park in Fountain Valley. Even the store’s plain warehouse with cement floors and exposed air ducts is too fancy for Sherinian’s tastes.

“If I had my way we’d be in a windowless warehouse, but we needed the extra parking space,” he says.

“We want customers to say, ‘Yes, I can understand why prices are so cheap. They’re in a warehouse.’ ”

The store has few customer comforts. There are shopping carts for loading up suits the way one would pile up groceries in a supermarket. There’s carpeting at the entrance and in the dressing rooms in case customers get cold feet, but even this is industrial-looking stuff.

“We picked out carpet that looked the color of cement,” Sherinian says.

His sole concession to decor are new faux black granite checkout counters.

“We were going to bring in used counters but we have too much taste.”

Such Spartan surroundings are designed to appeal to shoppers who don’t care for such extras as a pianist serenading them on a baby grand or a sales clerk hovering in their wake.

“A lot of people will still want a decision-maker to make up their mind for them,” Sherinian says. He hopes his customers will rely on friends or family for a second opinion.

What Sherinian hasn’t scrimped on is suits. The store has no less than 7,000 of them, as well as blazers, trousers, dress shirts, neckwear, socks and belts. There’s a rack of tuxedos for $150 each and a “wailing wall” of ties for $15.

A VIP room--actually just a roped-off area with a swatch of carpeting--has higher-end suits for about half off. A double-breasted olive wool suit with an easily recognizable Italian name sells for $595 here, where specialty stores might have it for $900 to $1,000.

“Eventually we’ll have some sportswear, but we want to be a suit store,” Sherinian says. “Our main list of suppliers includes 25 of the largest volume suit manufacturers.”

Long rows of suits in sizes up to 60 extra long fill most of the store. Sherinian carries multiples of popular colors and styles, and one or two of a fashion-forward item such as a chartreuse double-breasted blazer. On a recent Friday, 24 black wool suits in Size 38 regular hung from the racks.

A random survey of prices turned up gabardine suits with double-breasted blazers for $159, plaid sport coats for $80, contemporary silk shirts for $35, wool slacks for $40 and dress shirts for about $10 to $25.

The markup for clothes is never more than 30%; many retailers have a 100% markup, Sherinian says.

“We’ll never have a sale,” he says. “The prices are down and dirty. We can’t get them any lower.”

Sherinian hopes to lure business men who ordinarily shop department or specialty stores.

“See him? This is the guy we’re going after,” he says, spotting a young man in white shirt, tie and slacks rifling through the suit racks.

“Every time I see a guy in a white shirt I know he has a jacket somewhere, and there’s going to be a meeting. I call them ‘elevator riders’ because they usually work in office buildings.”

One customer, Brian Holbert, stands at the counter buying a navy wool suit for $343 similar to one he’d seen in a specialty store for $650. He’s also spotted a suit for $190 comparable to one he just bought at South Coast Plaza for $500.

“This is cool. I don’t like cheap suits,” Holbert says. “They have good prices for the quality.”

To Holbert, the store’s industrial atmosphere and lack of frills like track lighting and hunter green carpeting don’t matter.

“I just want a product. I don’t care about the environment.”

Whether 3 Day Suit Broker will indeed prosper in lean times remains to be seen. The store, which has been open just three weeks, is patterned after similar three-day businesses on the East Coast.

“When the recession started, we looked around and said, ‘Whose business is good?’ It turned out only those people doing three-day operations,” says Sherinian, who joined with business partners in Los Angeles in opening the store.

With the help of computerized cash registers that allow them to quickly track what sells and what doesn’t, they are already tailoring their inventory to Orange County.

“We had suspicions Orange County was very conservative. Now we know it is. Double-breasted high-fashion European suits do well in L.A., but here we find 70% of the men want single-breasted suits. Everyone wants to look like President Bush.”

Sherinian and his partners plan to open five more 3 Day Suit Brokers in Southern California if this venture succeeds.

“We’re hedging against bad times,” he says. “If this clicks, we’ll continue (to expand). If the recession get worse, this will help us survive.”