Offshore outsourcing

Interview with Mary Lou Chalmers about her experience working in Kansas City's garment industry from the late 1950s through late 1970s.. She discusses enrolling in the fashion design program at Kansas City Art Institute, as well as taking courses at Fanny Fern Fitzwater School of Fashion Illustration and the Isabelle Boldin School of Fashion, and then working in design and pattern-making at area garment companies such as Nelly Don and Gay Gibson. She describes the process of designing and making clothing, her experiences at numerous companies, the perks of working at Nelly Don, and times that her designs were featured in national magazines. She also discusses the decline of the garment fashion industry in the 1970s, the homogenization of shopping, and the shift to manufacturing in Asia.

Interview with Margie Bercu and her daughter Barbara Bloch about their family's history with Kansas City's garment district, and discuss what garment design and manufacturing still exist in Kansas City at the time of the interview. Barbara discusses her father Archie's start at Maurice Coat & Suit Company and later transition to Lan-Mar Sporting Goods, which manufactured little league baseball uniforms, basketball uniforms and other athletic apparel. Lan-Mar later spun off a company called Cotton Duck which manufactured restaurant uniforms and related apparel. The women also discuss Archie's education and military service, Barbara's continuing work with retail and restaurant uniforms through the 1980s, oursourcing of manufacturing, and remaining American textile manufacturing. The women also note several local companies continuing to work in garment production into the 2000s.

Interview with Suzie Aron about her family history in Kansas City's garment industry, beginning with her grandfather Hyman Gordon's immigration to Topeka, Kansas, and later to Kansas City. She discusses Jewish prevalence in the industry, and her family's Frances Gee Garment Company which focused primarily on uniforms for nurses and other woman-dominated professions - a direction taken because it was easier to work with all white fabric. She discusses the company being one of the first with overseas production facilities, having opened factories in Puerto Rico and Japan, as well as other aspects of the company's operations and union relationships, including her experience working on designing and branding uniforms for the fast food industry, work which eventually became the focus of the company.

Interview with Eddie Jacobs about his life and experience in the Kansas City garment industry. He recalls his family history, including his parents' immigrations from Poland and Russia, and starting out in the garment industry with his father and brother manufacturing children's clothes. He discusses their later transition into maternity wear, selling to department stores and mail order businesses, and also notes he opened fabric stores with his mother-in-law. He also discusses their relationship with the garment workers union, describes their staff and their small-town manufacturing, and notes that they once made up about 20% of the maternity wear market before closing in the 1980s. He shares photographs and notes maternity wear design elements.

Interview with Marvin Gibian about his family's history in the Kansas City garment industry. He recounts his father's background and work with various garment companies before opening Oakwood Sportswear, a men's and boys clothing wholesaler to shops in Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma until it closed in 1964. He discusses the work of selling throughout the region, their business during World War II, and the post-war shift in the industry from small, independent businesses to large chains. He also discusses the role of wholesalers in supporting the large mail order companies such as Sears Roebuck, Montgomery Ward, and National Bellas Hess.

Interview with Bill Kort about his life and his experience in the Kansas City garment industry working as a "bundle boy" as a teenager at Brand and Puritz in the early 1960s. He discusses asking his neighbor and friend's father Arthur Brand for a summer job, and being hired as a bundle boy who would take piece goods from station to station to have buttons added, collars sewn, or other discrete parts of the manufacturing process. He discusses the diversity of the workforce, his memories of the Garment District and Downtown Kansas City, and his later career in investments at H. O. Peet.

Interview with Ann Brownfield about her experience as a designer Kansas City and other Midwestern cities. She recalls her start designing shoes in St. Louis, later teaching pattern-making in Grand Island, Nebraska, and working in sportswear, coat, and suit design at Brand and Puritz after moving to Kansas City in 1960. She describes opening her own factory in Kansas City, Kansas, designing and sewing small collections for a variety of clients, including making warm-up suits for the 1972 US Olympic ski team; and her later closure due to the decline of skilled sewing machine operators. She also discusses the decline of the local industry, manufacturing moving overseas, and later working in retail, giving tours of the old garment district, and beginning to collect clothing and other items from local manufacturers.

Interview with Marshall Gordon about his family's experience in the Kansas City garment industry. His father, Hyman Gordon, operated the Frances Gee Company, manufacturing inexpensive housedresses during the Depression and World War II, later shifting to manufacturing uniforms. Marshall discusses working at the family business from 1960 to 1972, and returning after his father passed away in the early 1990s. He discusses their shift to manufacturing in Puerto Rico and Japan, the decline of the company, their relationship with the garment workers' union, as well as their real estate holdings and development work.

Interview with Bill Kaiser about his life and his company, the Bill Kaiser Company, which was a supplier to the Midwestern garment industry. He discusses his family's business importing sewing machine parts in New York, and starting his company in Kansas City after moving from New York in 1971 supplying local manufacturers with sewing machines and parts, pressing equipment, and other supplies. He notes that by 1971 manufacturing had largely moved out of the city into smaller regional towns, and says that he believes a resistance to new, faster technology and automation was a factor in the decline of the local industry. He also discusses the assembly line process of clothing manufacturing and the variety of machines and other equipment required for production, and the American garment industry's shift to overseas manufacturing.

Interview with Barbara Bloch about her family's history in the Kansas City garment industry. She discusses her family history in the business, sewing in the factory at 12 years old, and entering the restaurant uniform business by selling aprons to Kelly's Bar in Westport. She discusses the growth of that venture, her later work in direct sales of high-end clothing and accessories, and later opening Her Majesty's Closet, a luxury consignment store in Prairie Village, Kansas. She also notes new and remaining people in the local garment industry, as well as describing the business of operating her consignment store, and they discuss the prevalence of Jewish business owners in the industry.