Episode 2: The Power of Customer Relationships: A Legacy of Ken's Man's Shop with Kory Helfman
In this episode of the Main Street Matters podcast, host Teresa Zimmerman interviews Kory Helfman, the second-generation proprietor of Ken's Man’s Shop in Dallas, Texas.Kory discusses the shop's history and clientele, as well as his concerns about the future of Ken’s Man Shop and the tailoring business due to a lack of master tailors.
He emphasizes the importance of long-term relationships with clients, community support, and staying relevant through marketing and SEO. Kory also shares insights into the shop's operations, including the impact of natural disasters and the COVID-19 pandemic. He highlights the significance of service, quality, and community involvement in maintaining the shop's success and legacy.
Key topics in this episode:
-History and clientele of Ken's Man’s Shop
-Challenges and strategies for staying relevant in the tailoring business
-Scarcity of new tailors and tailor schools
-Importance of long-term relationships with clientele
-Diverse clientele served by Ken's Man’s Sho
-Impact of external factors such as natural disasters like tornado and the COVID-19 pandemic
-Importance of learning new skills like SEO and utilizing AI in business
-How he managed to acquire a new client through LinkedIn
-Future of the business and the changing retail landscape
Featured in this episode:
Ken’s Man’s Shop Website: https://kensmansshop.com/
Ken’s Man’s Shop Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kensmansshop/
Ken’s Man’s Shop LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ken's-man's-shop/
Connect with Kory Helfman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kory-helfman/
**Kory mentioned their new product called Ken’s Man’s Shop HYDROSHAVE you can check it here.
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Main Street Matters Podcast:
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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/main-street-matters/
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Host - Teresa Zimmerman:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/terresachristensonzimmerman/
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FULL TRANSCRIPT
Kory Helfman - We have a problem. There's not any new tailors being developed. There's not any new tailor schools out there. My youngest tailor is 69 years old. It is scary. There's not any new tailors now. They're seamstresses, but master tailors. They're hard to find because we're in the relationship business. And that's what we really have hung our hat on is being in a long term relationship business with our clientele, and now we're serving three and four generations old clientele.
Terresa Zimmerman - How do you stay relevant when you're when you're working with, you know, grandfather, father, son, maybe grandson? Welcome to the Main Street Matters podcast. I'm your host, Teresa Zimmerman. Hi, I'm Teresa Zimmerman, founder of Main Street Matters. I'm so happy to be joined today by Corey Huffman, second generation proprietor of Ken's Man Shop out of Dallas, Texas. He's here to tell us about what it is they do at Ken's man shop. Welcome.
Kory Helfman - Good morning Teresa. Thank you so much for having me on Main Street matters.
Terresa Zimmerman - I'm excited about this. So, it's really, it's really hearing your story, so maybe you can start us off here by giving us a little bit of introduction, to Ken's man shop and what you do.
Kory Helfman - You got it. So Theresa and my father started Ken's man shop in 1964, after working, many years over at a place in Castle Linda in Dallas, Texas, called Parisian Peyton's and his clientele there, where he was the manager said, hey, Kenny, if you ever open up your own shop, we would follow you. And so at age 27, he decided to have, more cajones. And, then he said, then brains. And he decided to open up his own shop. we wanted to open up, actually in Dallas at that time in 64, but back then everyone had exclusives. And also back then there was 42 men's stores throughout the city. so they said, you know, Kenny, you can't do that here. You need to move out to a suburb because he really wanted to bring in European fashion at that time in 19, in 1964.
Kory Helfman - So he, opened up in 1964, in Garland, Texas, and a very traditional blue collar town. and the funny thing is, is LBJ freeway wasn't even going out to there at that time. It was still Forest Lane, one of our major streets. Just to give you an idea of how long ago this was, and, we were open for four years, did great business. And he said, you know, we're just going to stay in Garland for a while. So we opened up a free standing store, which we built in Ridgewood Shopping Center across Kingsley Road. And then we were there for 25 years. So we were out in Garland for 29 years. And then the demographics in the late 80s, started turning in Garland, and it just wasn't. Part of where we needed to be and we needed to either close, shop or move. So a guy named Henry S Miller, who's famous in Dallas, realtor, owns massive commercial real estate. Now it's four generations old. And another guy named Roger Staubach, who was also helping.
Kory Helfman - And one of. We used to sell him some clothes. them to together help can find this place where we are now. And we've been in this location for 30 years, so we've been actually in Dallas longer than when we were in Garland. And this is our 60th year in business.
Terresa Zimmerman - Well that's amazing. So a couple questions. So what does it mean to be exclusive. So they used to have exclusive.
Kory Helfman - They used to have exclusives at like we wanted to open up Pierre Cardin some of the big names back then Oleg Cassini. And they said no, because Neiman Marcus has an exclusive or another store has an exclusive. So he opened up in Garland. No one had it because everyone was very traditional. the stores in Garland were extremely traditional.
Terresa Zimmerman - Well. So then the other thing you said, too, is, in Garland, you were he your your father wanted to wanted to bring European fashion and you took it to a blue collar area, and it worked. So that's not something I naturally feel goes together.
Terresa Zimmerman - But yeah, clearly it works.
Kory Helfman - It was. And we still have today, gentlemen coming in saying, I remember in 1967 or 1969 that I got my prom suit or I got my wedding suit there, and they were talking about it being powder blue or pastel colors or these big wide lapels in the 70s, which is funny because that's what's coming back right now.
Terresa Zimmerman - So coming back.
Kory Helfman - Yeah, we have a we have a history of archives that we go to and use all the time and show people, how this keeps on going. The pendulum swings back and forth.
Terresa Zimmerman - Like like a physical archive or we have both.
Kory Helfman - We have both. Our physical archive is actually sitting at the University of North Texas in Dallas, outside of Dallas, over in Denton, Texas. so our archive sits there, 55 years of scrapbooks and, marketing material and also clothing sit in their historical museum.
Terresa Zimmerman - That's amazing. Yeah. Well, okay, so you Garland, blue collar. You moved into where you are now. Dallas.
Terresa Zimmerman - So who do you serve then? How is your clientele changed or.
Kory Helfman - Well, what's funny is, is that what's funny about that is. And that's what everyone thinks, that we lost that clientele. We actually kept our original clientele because we're in the relationship business. And that's what we really have hung our hat on, is being in a long term relationship business with our clientele, and now we're serving three and four generations old of clientele. and what's funny is when we moved here in 1993. We were moving into our clients backyards. They had already moved out of Garland, and they had moved to Dallas and Preston Hollow and where we are.
Terresa Zimmerman - So you kind of join them.
Kory Helfman - We did. And then we and then we gained a whole new clientele as well. And we're still meeting people every day. that are brand new.
Terresa Zimmerman - And so tell me a little bit about that customer. What does that customer look like? Who do you serve?
Terresa Zimmerman - You know.
Kory Helfman - People I think expect us to be serving 1% or the one percenters.
Kory Helfman - And that's not the truth here. We serve everyone, we serve any man that walks in the store. And it doesn't matter if you are the CEO of fortune 500, if you're an entrepreneur, a doctor. we're having a lot of people in tech find us now. finance, you name it. We have a wide smattering of, service throughout Dallas with Dallas men. I can't peg our clients. I can say that the the majority loved the golf. The majority love fine wine and great food and nice cars. love the travel. But as far as their positions, it's all over the board from middle managers on up.
Terresa Zimmerman - Right. Well. And you've got beautiful racks of, suits behind you. So, is is that primarily what people come in for? What do they come to you?
Kory Helfman - Actually, they come to us because we hang our hat. Also, on being a full scale haberdashery, which is missing in today's market. So you can come in here and yes, you can get your business suit, but you can also get formal wear for any occasion.
Kory Helfman - We can also sell you shorts, swim trunks, t shirts, you name it. we have everything from the hats to the shoes and everything in between.
Terresa Zimmerman - I now check out your Instagram page. You've got some amazing pictures of all you guys looking smart and suits and tuxedos there.
Kory Helfman - I will say that it's funny, even though the economy is showing that the work dress place has gone down as far as being too casual, our suit sales are better now than they were before Covid.
Terresa Zimmerman - Oh it is. It's amazing. well, so let's talk about the day to day. So, maybe describe a day or a week to us. What is your day to day look like?
Kory Helfman - as an entrepreneur or as a haberdasher or as an owner? There's many different hats I wear.
Terresa Zimmerman - That you want to put on. Right. So if you think about, other people such as yourself, listening to this and hearing your story, they're living the same thing you are, I am sure. So maybe get specific. Like, what's your biggest challenge every day? And what do you put on to to to to feel or tackle that challenge? You know.
Kory Helfman - When you walk in you have a plan, a game plan of what you need to accomplish, what you want to accomplish personally for that day, for yourself and for your team and the business. And what I love is, is that you never know what's coming. You don't know who's going to walk in. You don't know what's going to happen when the phone rings and email a text and you have to pivot quickly. and you have to be on your best game all the time to pivot quickly because as I said earlier, we're in the relationship business. So we have long term relationships and you want to be on your best behavior, your best self, thinking ahead for your clientele, as far as their clothing, their closets, their needs, right now a lot of our clientele are preparing for family travel, second homes, things like that. We have a lot of gentlemen that are going to Europe right now with their families or with their significant others, and when they do that, they need to dress appropriately.
Kory Helfman - So we're trying to help them achieve what they need. So there's that's just one small side. Of course, there's the other side of ownership of dealing with, maybe lease negotiations coming up on your rent or dealing with the insurance that, keeps on creeping up or something keeps on coming in or social media that has to be addressed every single day in different ways. So you just every every second you're changing a hat, you're staying the same. You're just changing your head. I mean, and that's fine. That's the beautiful part about it. Either either you love to do that or you don't need to be doing that.
Terresa Zimmerman - Right? Right. Yeah. We talked a little bit about that on the social media front. so would you be comfortable describing like a particular challenge you had, either in a day or season? and then how you, how you overcame that challenge in your,
Kory Helfman - That's a great question. And I would say one of the biggest things was in 2018, at the end of October, on a Sunday, an EF three tornado came through Dallas and tore up 17 miles of Dallas.
Kory Helfman - luckily it was on a Sunday night. It was during the Dallas Cowboys Philadelphia Eagles game. And if it wasn't for that game, hundreds of people probably would have lost their lives. But everyone was at home. So that was, a saving grace, if you can say, to have that game on. But. It tore through this neighborhood where we are situated in Preston Hollow. And if I look out this window right here, that whole center across the street was gone, was literally gone, wiped to the ground. And we, of course, had our windows damaged, doors damaged, roof damaged, AC units blown into another neighborhood. And it took weeks to get power restored and things back to normal. And we were wondering if we could do business again. And that's October. October is almost like our Christmas time. October. November are bigger than December. and if it wasn't for the amazing community. This neighborhood, our clientele that came out of the blue and supported us during that time, where we were just trying to put things back together.
Kory Helfman - We wouldn't have made it. And I have to say, that's the same thing during Covid when you're 60. Percent, down 70%, down 80%, down on a month. And you're wondering, how are you going to feed your people? How are you going to keep the doors open, but your clientele help find a way?
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. Well that's that's amazing. That's a that's a crazy story. and I'm sure you were right there in the thick of it, helping your neighbors, too.
Kory Helfman - We were, we were during that tornado time and also during the Covid time. So instead of them coming to us, we went to them just like restaurants, you know, decided to not stay open, but they just put their stuff outside. That's how we acted like as well. We were just going to their homes.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. Well, well. All right, well, let's mix it up and be happier. so, so tell me about a joy in your business. What do you love?
Kory Helfman - You know, I absolutely love.
Kory Helfman - Well, number one, I love the relationships. I love the. Growth of them. And to watch people either get married, have kids, their kids grow, and then their kids are graduating college now. I've been in this business 32 years, so I get to see a generation go through. I love my team. They're. They're my family. I get to be with them every single day. And yes, we have some challenges. And yes, we don't see eye to eye every day, but we're family at the end of the day, and we're friends and we really deeply care about each other. So that's probably one of the best things, is to be able to work with amazing people every day. and then on the other side is people like yourself and people in our industry that become lifelong friends through years and years or decades of just working together in a partnership and agreement. So you people in our store, that shop with us, they feel the synergy from our side all the way back to your side, because we talk about you as a woman owner and we talk about other companies like they were just one, one extension removed from us.
Terresa Zimmerman - yeah. That's, that's the part I love as well. but so talking about that multigenerational clientele and an extended, you know, staff, how do you stay relevant when you're, when you're working with, you know, grandfather, father, son, maybe grandson? I'm the styles change, colors change. You know, how do you stay relevant for all of for that that wide expanse of clientele that we do.
Kory Helfman - so one of the things that we offer in our store is we just don't exclusively go after the super high end. we have shirts in the store from 125 up to $350. So we have a suit in the store at 1095, and then we have 2795. So we have a wide variety for different ages and economical situations, which help. And we also make sure that we have besides slim contemporary and classic fits. We also have the same thing with the style of things. Some things are going to be a little bit trimmer for that guy who wants that look, but some guys are just more classic.
Kory Helfman - So we have a nice offering.
Terresa Zimmerman - Do you when you go to the trade shows? When you walk trade shows, do you, do you look for that new for that younger generation, knowing that they're going to be your future clientele or how do you deal?
Kory Helfman - No, I don't actually pinpoint a generation or pinpoint a person. I know what to buy for the store. It's almost instinctive after all these years. and then everything needs to flow back and forth together. So it's funny, the buying, the buying is probably the most stressful point of the seasons of each year. just because putting that all together over the 2 to 3 weeks that we're all traveling together.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. And a lot of people would think a lot of people not in the business would think that that's the most fun. Oh you get to go out on buying sprees. Well. It's. Not. I mean, you could you can create some joy out of it, but it's not that bad.
Kory Helfman - Well, I mean, it is fun, but it's challenging.
Kory Helfman - That's probably one of the most challenging things. because if you have a really bad bye, you're not going to have a great season. So you need to focus in on your strengths and what we try to do here. Because you asked about fashion. we don't buy a lot of high fashion or a large percentage of it. It's anywhere from 5% to 12%. No more than that, because that's not what our store is. We're not a high fashion store. our guys are not on the runway. Our guys are running the city council.
Terresa Zimmerman - Right? Right. Well, and then how do you bring your team involved in that. So you talked about your team and they're your family. how do they get on the same page as you with what Ken's man shop is?
Kory Helfman - Well, luckily I have a wide variety of, haberdashers here at the shop. John has been the longest tenure as far as being in the men's industry. He's has over 50 years experience. Mark has over 40 years of experience. Caroline has been with me almost 20 years.
Kory Helfman - Kramer's now been with me, I think, for, he's 25. and I've been at, at 32. And then we have, we have tailors that have been with us just as long.
Terresa Zimmerman - So. So they're just a fabric of the of the business.
Kory Helfman - Exactly. And the nice thing is we we our haberdashers actually hit every decade if you think about it. So you see everything. And we all dress accordingly.
Terresa Zimmerman - So are there, tools, techniques that you use in your business that are, that you consider kind of viable?
Kory Helfman - Absolutely. I would have to say marketing the marketing team is one of my most important assets. as far as just always being in touch with the clientele through our email or texting, letting them know the new things, what's happening. events that we do, we do quite a few events during the spring and the fall. I have to say, SEO has become a very large portion of the store. We've been at it for almost four years now. So the SEO is extremely important to us.
Kory Helfman - We do four pages a month of handwritten SEO pages based on a brand topic, based on something that's coming up in an event. And what we've learned over this time is that Google's algorithm actually is not as fast as we think. We think, oh, let's put that SEO page out about somewhere right now. Well, that Google algorithm is going to start really maximizing in about two and a half to three months. So if I do it right now, I'm already at the end of the summer. I should have put that out about six weeks ago. So you need to really think ahead for your Google algorithm, because the way SEO pages gain, traction and then start moving up based on what people are needing and writing about. So, and we have a very large SEO backdrop now, which is, I would have to say. You know, you always say referrals or number one, advertising number two, and then you have more. I'm going to say CEOs. Now number two. Wow. Yeah.
Kory Helfman - I mean, that's kind of because the things we write about are actually bringing people in.
Terresa Zimmerman - That's amazing. And so how do you capture that? When they come in, you ask them, you.
Kory Helfman - Say, what brings you in? It's usually a new client, not someone who's been existing with us for a long time because they already have in need, or they know what they're coming in for. people come in and just say, yeah. You know, I was researching Alberto genes, and I realized that you guys are have it. So we wrote a page about Alberto and the brand and why it's important to us. you know, how to wear, how to tie a bow tie, how to wear a vest with a pair of jeans. Just things that you think that are. Off topic are actually on topic.
Terresa Zimmerman - Oh, yeah. No, believe me, I understand all the stuff that you think is basic and that people already know about. But, you know, you've got to keep.
Terresa Zimmerman - Telling them and telling them. And, yeah, it's, it's good education, educational.
Kory Helfman - And we have a, we have an SEO page on, you know, t shirts on, undershirts from wood underwear and why they're important for your dress wear.
Terresa Zimmerman - One. That one is that you also do a blog. I do, and I love the passion on your blog and it's very personal. You know.
Kory Helfman - when I started writing blogs, one of the things I love to do is write. my mom was a teacher her whole career. she gave me the gift of reading, gave me the gift of writing, gave me the gift, actually, of teaching itself, which I can talk about later. so about the blogs. I try to write two to a month. I would love to write more, but it's just I don't have that amount of time. And what I try to focus in on is our mantra. The Ken's moonshot mantra is service, quality and community. And so when I write my blog, I try to make sure that I'm hitting what is the service that we're providing? What are we going to educate our clients on? What's the value that they're going to take from this? talk about the quality of the clothing, the quality of the relationship, the quality of something that's here.
Kory Helfman - And then, of course, a community aspect. And one of those are last weekend we were at the American Heart Association, our entire team, giving back to the community, giving back to American Heart. And it was amazing event. But it's that we get to write about it and then show our clientele or people that read. I also find it a fascinating that I put that out on LinkedIn a lot, and I get a lot of new clientele from LinkedIn, quite often.
Terresa Zimmerman- You don't. I think it's an underutilized resource for our community, for our community of independent stores. LinkedIn. I don't. Yes, I think LinkedIn is underutilized in our, you know, our peer groups here with independent stores. So it's interesting to hear that you're finding a lot of positive outcomes on that.
Kory Helfman - Where else would businessmen and women go to talk business or hear about business? And the nice thing about LinkedIn, it's not overly advertised, not, you know, horrible social issues going here or there or world problems.
Kory Helfman - It's just business. And I'm in business to do business and so are they. So I might as well talk a little bit about business. And you can't just be all business. You need to talk about some personal matters.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah, well, and that's where I love your blog because I, and I do, if I miss it an email, I, I see it on LinkedIn. LinkedIn captures it for me. So I love that you put it there too. and then you introduce things all the time on your blog that I think are fascinating. So in this last one that I just read, you have Ken isms. You want to talk about some.
Kory Helfman - So my dad was famous for his quotes. and now all the dirty ones have just surfaced, this early in the morning. and now I'm going to start sweating and turning red because I loved his, Well, one of them is that we just put. So we just launched a new brand for the store. It's our Ken's man shop, Hydra shave.
Kory Helfman - So it's a face wash. Hydra shave and shave cream. And my dad had this wonderful thing, saying to people that was, we can change anything but the face. And I always love that. And Cramer's actually handing me this. So here's our Ken's man chop hydra shave. And then we put it into a koozie. And then it says we can change anything but the face, which is my dad's quote. And then underneath I said, yeah, until now, because the Hydra shave can change the face for you. So we're now. Love that.
Terresa Zimmerman - So that's brand new. Like brand new, like this month. Friendship.
Kory Helfman - Actually brand new as of this week.
Kory Helfman - Well, we've.
Kory Helfman - Been in formulation for about six months. and we are literally overjoyed with the product. All the clients that have bought it so far have already given us amazing reviews. It's 100% organic and 100% locally made. So, we'll have this on our website hopefully by next week to sell online to the continental United States.
Terresa Zimmerman - And and you got to add to your doubts.
Kory Helfman - And I got to add my dad's quote. Yeah, yeah. And so, so as we were getting ready to do another phase of the store in 2017, I bought the business from my dad in 2016, and that was also the year he retired. and then in 2017, we started tweaking and rebranding a little bit of the physical, store just to kind of update it, make it more modern, not so old school, like, opened up the windows, like iPhone store windows. So top floor to floor to ceiling windows that you can see all the way through the store. And we have a we have two entrances which everyone loves. So we get a lot of natural light coming in. and then 2018, we were interrupted by one of those phases with We're interrupted with one of those phases with the tornado, and then we are interrupted with another with Covid. So now this year, we're getting ready to start a new phase of the store, which we're excited, and we're going to be putting some of these Ken isms into the store.
Terresa Zimmerman - Oh, nice. The dirty ones as well.
Kory Helfman - Probably not. But we'll leave those for the dressing room.
Terresa Zimmerman - So you can just put the, the little ampersands and the, and the at signs. Right. in place. Love that. And and so, you know, continuing on with your dad's legacy a little bit, I see on your website you have connections, Kenny.
Kory Helfman - Yeah. So instead of mannequins in the window, we love to call them Kenny Guns. you know, my dad was a dapper dresser, from day one, so we always said, would kin like this? Would can wear this. And we always say, absolutely. And if you notice in our store, here's another Kenny ism. coming up, if you notice in our store, one of the mannequins or Ken Akins would always have the color purple running through it. So my dad's favorite color was purple, and he never called it purple, though he always called it Jewish Navy.
Terresa Zimmerman - Oh, gosh.
Kory Helfman- So we have people that literally come in and say, hey, can you show me some Jewish Navy?
Terresa Zimmerman - That is hysterical.
Terresa Zimmerman - That is so funny. your your dad must have been a pretty big personality.
Kory Helfman - Was a small statured man with an amazing humor and personality. he always remembered people's names, and he always remembered a joke. Yeah. Great.
Terresa Zimmerman - so. So is he. Is he the one that really kind of started that community thing and made you fall in love with, you know, the relationship based business? Would you attribute that to him or how did that go?
Kory Helfman - that's a great question. He was involved in the community, early on. and then when I joined him, I think our community outreach was put on steroids.
Terresa Zimmerman - Well, yeah. You guys are crazy involved in so many.
Kory Helfman - So we were just involved with, let's say, Scottish Rite Hospital. We were involved with the Dallas Cowboys. We're involved. with a lot of Garland activities. but when we came here and I was full time joining them here, that's where we changed our mindset. And so, besides those activities with, the same players, we would get involved with the American Heart Association, the Halliburton Association, the Dallas City Council.
Kory Helfman - All the churches, schools, private schools around us. It's. Yeah. And public schools, you name it, we're involved.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. And so how do you decide what you get involved with? Because that's a lot of time. It's a lot of time. It's it's investment and time and treasure. So how are you deciding what fits and what doesn't?
Kory Helfman - That's also a great question. Some of those are just based on us giving certificates and to get donations so people are able to, raise their silent auctions. So that's kind of a simple thing. I, I chose long ago that or I realized long ago that I can only do so much and I can only say yes so many times before I've said yes so many times that I'm failing. So now I choose to say yes to things that I'm not only passionate about, but the things that I can give my time to wisely. And luckily I have a team that also is able to give as well.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. so growing up, did you know you would always join this business?
Kory Helfman - I have to say, I had an inclination that I would, Because I worked in the store as a young boy, you know, vacuuming carpets, cleaning out the ashtrays, which was disgusting.
Kory Helfman - cleaning the mirrors and listening to the stories. running errands for the store. One of my favorite things. I'll tell you a little story that my dad would send me across the street when I was about nine years old, and this was Kingsley Road, and there wasn't a stoplight. So I would, like, literally run across a busy street to go to the pharmacy. And I'd go to, Rick, who was the pharmacist. And I would get, my dad would say, go get me a pack of cigarettes and go get me. Rick has something for me. And it was always in a paper bag, and I thought it was just the coolest thing that would go up. And I'd have some money, and I'd hand it over and I'd get the cigarettes, which everyone back then was smoking, and my dad actually smoked in the store, if you could believe that or not. and then it would also have a paper bag. Didn't know what was in it. I found out years later that what was in the paper bag was a Playboy magazine.
Terresa Zimmerman - You never once opened that paper bag.
Kory Helfman - He never opened the bag, so I just listened.
Kory Helfman - Oh.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. Oh, what a day.
Kory Helfman - And now I think of myself. I would never when my kids were that age, I would never send in a store to say, hey, go get me a pack of cigarettes and some, pornographic magazine.
Terresa Zimmerman - Well, you also wouldn't send them across a busy.
Kory Helfman - Road.
Terresa Zimmerman - Either. Probably, right? Yeah, yeah, but, you know, we all live through those things, so, you know, maybe it gave us, extra fortitude or something, I don't know.
Kory Helfman - Well, and the funny thing is, this article.
Kory Helfman - Was never part of the store in Garland. Our Taber Taylor was actually across the street, so we would actually have to run across the street all the time, back and forth with alterations.
Terresa Zimmerman - And you love to do that so much, you decided to join the business.
Kory Helfman - I think what I did is I was I started working at age 15, and everything I've worked towards has kind of led me towards this.
Kory Helfman - I've always been in the restaurant or bar business. I've always been in a service business. so I've always loved to serve. And this is what we do here. We just serve. So, yes, it was just meant to be. And then one quick thing is my mom's side. My great grandfather had the first general stores in the panhandle of Texas. So, I mean, we have merchant blood in us on both sides.
Terresa Zimmerman - Right? Amazing. That's great. so I, I know you've got to open your store soon, but, is there anything that you want to talk about that we haven't talked about? And then I've got a couple of bonus.
Kory Helfman - Questions, you know?
Kory Helfman - I think that. If my dad were here today, my dad passed away, by the way. So I lost my dad this year in January 13th. And I think to myself daily, would he enjoyed the business now and I don't think he would. I don't think he would enjoy what's going on in the business with the way brands sell directly to consumers, the way that they.
Kory Helfman - Are in competition with us and not partnership with us anymore. that would disturb him deeply. the loyalty that we used to have with brands is. Becoming less and less. The playbooks have changed. It's like someone threw out the rulebook of how to have etiquette, etiquette and. It's not. That handshake deal that we used to have looked someone in the eye and say, I promise you, I trust you. I believe in you. This will work. Now you have to kind of question it. Is it going to work? so that I think that's a problem, that we're dealing with on today, business owners, small merchants like myself. and hence why I think you're seeing a larger majority of us looking at private label as an answer so we can move away from the big brands awareness and what they're doing. I think that's one of our big challenges.
Terresa Zimmerman - And how, how are you finding, doing that? I mean, private label, that's got to be, you know, a different set of it is.
Kory Helfman - I mean, I'm not a designer by trade. I just know what sells and what works within our shop to our clientele. luckily, I've been partnering over the years with a variety of brands who are offering me private label services, which I'm taking advantage of and a variety of price ranges with that. And that comes from anywhere from. Portugal, Turkey, Italy, Canada, I mean, bouncing all over the world to find that, so when you look through the store, it's not the largest percent is Ken's man shop. But each classification now has a private label business behind it, which is also helping offset margins as well.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. well, that maybe leads me into one of my bonus questions. You know, you've, in, you know, 2 or 3, five years from now, whatever that time frame is. What's the biggest change you see coming up next, and how do you prepare for that?
Kory Helfman - I'm preparing for it now. There's going to be three things I'm going to talk about.
Kory Helfman - Number one, everyone's talking about AI. you do need to be on top of AI. You do need to have some understanding of how anywhere from ChatGPT all the way to AI works, and how it can help your business and not crush your business because it can't help your business. So just understand it. And if you don't understand it, find someone smarter than yourself to help you understand it and help it work. It works within any business. but I don't think it's going to take away the basics of service, the basics of relationship quality, or community work. That's going to be still what we're going to hang our hat on. so I just be aware of it because it will help you. I think another challenge is, is that. As I told you, my employees have a wide demographic of decades of experience, but my older ones are not getting any younger. so how do you replace a seasoned veteran of 50 years or 40 years or myself? How do I replace myself of 30 years as I grow in age? So that's kind of my next question of how do I find those people without I don't I'm not a big believer of stealing from other stores.
Kory Helfman - That's not who we are. it just happens that we find great team members and we go out there and make a connection and they join our family. So I am actively searching for that next generation of workers. Who's going to propel us into the next step? speaking along those lines. A situation that I think 100% of all retailers need to be talking about. and we need to talk about this at every level, from dry cleaners to big department stores, small merchants like myself, anyone who uses a tailor. We have a problem. There's not any new tailors being developed. There's not any new tailor schools out there. my youngest tailor is. 69 years old. So yeah, it's scary. There's not any new tailors now. There's seamstresses, but master tailors. They're hard to find. And then when we try to go to other countries and bring them in, that's even more difficult with government regulations. So we need to have this discussion as a whole of how does America bring in more tailors? Because it's a trade that we need.
Terresa Zimmerman - Yeah. Well, has that discussion started? I mean, we could go down a whole rabbit hole on this, but, do you know that that discussion is started? We've been.
Kory Helfman - So I actually sit in a retail group and we've been talking about this for a couple of years. There really hasn't been big pushes on it. We've tried anything from Indeed.com to LinkedIn to other things to find our tailors or bring them in. but finding them is like finding a needle in a haystack. We do not have an answer to this problem as of yet, but but the question is on the table, though, and I bring it up to anyone I talked to.
Terresa Zimmerman - Right? Yeah, and I've heard that from others as well. I get that's very serious. How are you using? I if I can jump back to your.
Kory Helfman - First I'm using.
Kory Helfman - It in marketing. So my marketing team uses AI, which is helping us with the SEO pages. They're not writing our SEO pages. We write our own.
Kory Helfman - That's how they become personal, personable. But, we're using it in our marketing. And then, You know, sometimes you get formulaic in your thank you letters and you find like you're writing the same thank you letter over and over and like, well, that's just kind of silly. So I went to ChatGPT a couple of months ago and I said, hey, ChatGPT, I'm an old school haberdasher. and this is my client. And I described him, and this is what he likes to do, and I need the right just four quick lines to get to the point of a thank you letter. And it was beautiful. I mean, and then I had to tweak it with a little personal messages, but it was perfect. So ChatGPT I yeah, you can find ways to have fun with it.
Terresa Zimmerman - That's great. That's great. Well, and my last bonus question. Who or what brings out the best in you for your team?
Kory Helfman - My family. my family is number one, without a doubt.
Kory Helfman - I always want to do right by them. I always want to. Make sure that I'm. I'm making them proud to have this store legacy here for 60 years. We have a very large family and I love every single one of them. and then it's also my team. I want to be here for my team, and I want to support them. And I want to see them succeed. And their success just makes me feel better inside. I don't lose sleep over the decisions I make day to day because I feel like I make the right decisions every day. For those people.
Kory Helfman - That's that's.
Terresa Zimmerman - That's great. That's great, I love that. All right, well, I'm going to let you open your store. So I'll let you go. But thank you so much for for having this conversation with me.
Kory Helfman - I really you're very welcome.
Kory Helfman - Theresa.
Terresa Zimmerman - It's,
Kory Helfman - Yeah. Well, Theresa, it's absolutely. It was an honor to be asked. It's an honor to work with you because I follow your career and your trajectory.
Kory Helfman - And I always use you as an example of a woman owner and a men's business. and you're exceptional. and I just wish you everything you wish yourself.
Speaker UU - Now I'm the one that's going to start blushing. Thank you.
