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Levi's: Not for All americans

If the pistol-packing cowboys of the 1800s had to go through what Al Sultan's been through just to get a pair of Levi's, there might well be a showdown.

Levi Strauss & Co. has taken control over the corporate world of the American jeans industry and propelled small business owners into years of begging and fighting with this supposedly all-American company, say several small retailers.

"Levi Strauss & Co., from all the way through the early part of this century, was built on the backs of retail stores and now has abandoned them by controlling the product and making them unavailable," says Al Sultan, buyer for Jeffrey's Men's Shops, who believes Levi discriminates against stores that don't fit the company's image. Sultan says he's forced to buy used Levi's and "loose interpretations of original" off of "bootleggers" because Levi won't give Jeffrey's Men's Shops a contract.

Sultan says that if his store can't stock Levi's, it can't compete with other stores that are able to stock the brand.

"Almost every customer that comes in is looking for Levi's," says Sultan. "And if I don't have Levi's I loose that sale."

Sultan's shop isn't the only store suffering under Levi Strauss & Co.'s policy, according to Kirsten Quistberg of Held Over on Haight Street.

"Levi Strauss & Co. doesn't give out contracts anymore, we have tried for years and it's impossible for little stores to buy in such large quantities, they just won't start new contracts," says Quistberg.

Levi Strauss & Co. gears its products toward men and women between ages 14-24, according to Julie Holzknecht, a Levi Strauss & Co. representative. The company's marketing strategy tries to "narrow the gap between how our clothes are marketed and making our customers pleased," says Holzknecht. "We like to enhance how our products are displayed in stores."

Levi's has striven to create a positive image of itself and its founder Levi Strauss. The company's official press relations biography of Strauss quotes from a special resolution by the San Francisco Board of Trade; "Mr. Strauss... as a liberal, public-minded citizen and whose numberless unostentatious acts of charity in which neither race nor creed were recognized, exemplified his broad and generous love for and sympathy with humanity."

Used Levi's are also high in demand. Some used Levi's sell for as much as $1,500 at used clothing or antique shops. "We can't keep 'Redlines' and 'Big E' types of classic Levi's in our store right now and the prices are out of control," says Jordan Moore of La Rosa, a vintage clothing store also on Haight Street.

Holzknecht says her company "disapproves" of what it calls the "black market." When asked what Levi considers the black market Holzknecht answers, "You know what I mean."

"I have reason to believe that Levi's has sent private investigators on several occasions to my store to see if I'm selling counterfeit Levi's," Sultan says.

Holzknecht would not comment on any of these issues, saying, "We don't comment on specific accounts due to rights and privacy of our customers."

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