Shortly after V-J day on May 8, 1945, with defense layoffs imminent, Jimmy and Tedi made the risky decision of starting a dress-making business, known at various times as Craig-Craig--California, Tedi Barri – California, and eventually as Kim’s of California. The concept revolved around an idea for manufacturing small girls’ dresses in a way that would reduce ironing time (this was before the era of synthetic materials). The dresses were designed so they could be laid flat on an ironing board by using “drawstrings” in the neck, sleeves, and waist which could be loosened before ironing and tightened again after the dress was put on. The idea also lent itself well to accommodating the same dress size to different childrens' sizes. Keywords in the advertising material were “iron-flat” and “adjustable-fit” as applied to “slim, average, or chubby girls” – advertising copy from perhaps before the days of political correctness.
The business was originally run out of a top-floor loft in the Pan-American Building at 253 S. Broadway in downtown LA (just a few steps from the colorful area housing such attractions as the Million Dollar Theater, the Central Market, the Angel’s Flight funicular, and the old Red Line Terminal!). The building was old and rickety and perhaps something of a fire-trap, but it provided a low-cost solution to running a dress manufacturing business on a shoe-string budget. There were a half-dozen or so “operators” – women who sat at the various sewing machines and produced the dresses. The labor budget was typically about 240 man-hours a week – approximately 6 operators working an 8-hour day, 5 days a week. In addition to the typical single-needle Singer sewing machines, there were also a double-needle, a four-needle, a sewpink, a blindstitch, an overlock, a bartack, and a buttonhole machine – all of which required skilled operators, as well as regular maintenance.
The business initially went well with orders coming in from all over the world, including England, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand. However, it soon became clear that without a line of credit sufficient to smooth out seasonal variations, both in procuring materials and in obtaining orders, considerable problems lay ahead. In an attempt to procure the needed materials, they formed a partnership with another dressmaking firm – Lurrie Pizer under the ownership of Joe and Bernice Pizer – and moved the business to their much nicer facility at 943 South Wall Street, also in downtown LA just a few blocks away. Pizer had promised he could get them materials, but the partnership turned into a disaster, since his apparent intent was simply to put them out of business, rather than help them. The business limped along in a precarious state for 3 years until May 1948, when it finally slid into bankruptcy – perhaps somewhat mercifully for the state of health of the entrepreneuring Craigs running the business!
Publicity 1
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194xxxxx -- Article in CS Monitor
Photo of Tedi 1
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Brochure 1
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Complete Brochure as PDF Document(3.5 Mbytes)
Attorney (Vernon Bettin) Letters 1
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Shutdown Announcement 1
Operations (Shutdown Details) 1
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