FASHION : Queen of the Deal Wins Susie’s a Loyal Following
She’s been called “the undertaker” in the fashion business. But not even that stops Susie Hyman from haggling for a deal. Rock-bottom prices are her stock and trade. Discount stores--she now owns 80 across the Southwest--are her metier . And young women with a minimum-wage job and a heavy social schedule are her best customers.
Maybe her tactics are a little rough around the edges. She walks into a garment factory at the end of a season. The manufacturer is overstocked and the leftovers have to go. It’s either deal with Hyman or risk no deal at all. She’s got them where she wants them, and she’s not afraid to squeeze.
Before it’s over, Hyman pays just a fraction of what some retailers paid at the start of the season. Then she passes along the discount, pricing her wares as much as 70% off full retail prices. Her stores, with branches in Simi Valley, Santa Ana, Anaheim and Riverside, are packed with trendy items--boyfriend jackets, rayon retro dresses, vests, palazzo pants, anoraks, hair ornaments and jewelry. Nothing is more than $20.
What’s her secret? Chutzpah.
That and a time-tested spiel. “They couldn’t pay me to take this,” she groans, holding up a particularly hideous apple green nylon and spandex sarong skirt.
“You have to know your customer. My customer will not understand this.”
Then it’s on to another mountain of clothes.
“If you hold onto this, do you think it’s like a fine wine? It will get better with time?” Hyman goads a manufacturer who doesn’t want to give in to a low price. “Get rid of it now. It’s not going to make you any money later. It’s definitely not a Rothschild.”
While she’s willing to haggle for some things, she turns her nose up at others. “People sometimes think because it’s a good price, we should take it,” she says. “But that’s not it. I say ‘no’ to a lot of people.
“Our incentive is to have the right item for less. And we do whatever it takes.” Even if it means wearing everybody down.
“Susie’s a killer,” says George Randall, YES Clothing Co. chairman and CEO. “She makes sure she’s gotten the lowest price. She’s sharp as a tack.”
Such dubious compliments are nothing new to the 36-year-old Hyman, a sturdy, straight-shooter who’s been nickel-and-diming junior sportswear manufacturers for more than two decades.
She got her start selling salt shakers and tea towels at Southern California swap meets as a teen-ager in the early ‘70s. She and her older brothers--the third generation in a family of merchants--began a friendly competition to see who could sell the most leftover knickknacks from their mother’s gift shop.
She would even buy from one swap-meet vendor and sell to another just for the sheer pleasure of making a deal and a few dollars.
The siblings, Stephen, David and Susie, soon realized that clothing was one of the fastest sells, and they made it a priority. A few years later, while Hyman was still in high school, they opened their first retail store, Smarty Pants. The Rosemead store was stocked with junior sportswear at affordable prices.
By 1981, Smarty Pants had grown to 18 stores, but the recession that year forced them to adopt a strict price structure. They put a $10 price ceiling in the stores and renamed them Susie’s Deals. Now, with a $20 limit, the chain is worth a reported $50 million.
Some of her competitors might like to portray her as a pushy workaholic, but there are signs of another side. She’s the mother of an 11-month-old and the leader of her 6-year-old’s Girl Scout troop.
Even George Randall of YES, who often grapples with her over prices, concedes, “When she arrives, it’s a social event. She has a sense of humor. A lot of them (discounters) are stick-in-the-muds.”
But it’s her lust for bargains that has won her a following. A typical Susie’s customer lives with her parents and spends much of her disposable income on clothes and makeup. (There are a few exceptions. Tammy Faye Bakker used to be a regular at the earrings counter in the Palm Desert store.) When she goes to the football games on Friday nights, she likes to wear a new outfit each time. She probably doesn’t read fashion magazines as much as she follows the fashion tastes of her peers. She waits to see trendy items in mall stores, then comes to Susie’s to see what’s comparable at a lower price.
Regulars know what to expect at Susie’s. All the stores are stocked with neat, closely-spaced racks of colorful, casual junior sportswear. Most of her brands are not well-known, though there are occasional finds, like a Capezio cardigan or a No Excuses jean skirt. And always, there is a sense of fun--which Hyman takes along with her to the bargaining table.
For example, when neither side will budge on a price, Hyman pulls out a quarter and offers to flip for it. “Sometimes I win. Sometimes I lose,” she shrugs. “I have a pretty good record.”
