Shinola not so Shiny after all?

[Spartan]

except that workforce didn't actually exist and they all needed to be trained...according to Shinola. Detroit is completely irrelevant to the assembly of anything Shinola makes.

You know, except for the fact that Detroit is where they assemble/make the things. How is that irrelevant? They chose to be in Detroit because of its manufacturing history. They could have went anywhere they wanted. Why is it a problem that they are using Detroit's manufacturing history to their advantage? Would people have rather seen them go somewhere else?

[bailey]

. They could have went anywhere they wanted.

Yes. Thank you. That is the point. They are completely and totally unconnected to Detroit outside of the marketing campaign.

[Detroitnerd]

Here's another good idea that's going to bring jobs and publicity to Detroit:

https://www.facebook.com/detroitpackard

[Spartan]

Yes. Thank you. That is the point. They are completely and totally unconnected to Detroit outside of the marketing campaign.

No, they are completely and totally CONNECTED to Detroit, because this is where they operate. If they had moved to Portland, they may have utilized a "Made in Portland" campaign. I just don't understand how advertising that you are local could ever be considered a bad thing, just because you could be somewhere else. Isn't that kind of the point?

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Read the thread. This is not the issue and it's been explained multiple times.

Actually, many posters on this thread have made the point numerous times that the watches or bikes are being "assembled" and not "manufactured" in Detroit, so its a major part of the thread to others, even if it may not be to you.

The other part of the thread seems to be that its inappropriate to highlight the skill of the Detroit workers in a "marketing" campaign. I tend to think that anything that portrays Detroit in a good light, and makes people think that perhaps its a good place to do business is not a bad thing. I guess ruin porn is more to their liking. Certain posters even seem to think that training workers to do a new type of skilled assembly is a bad thing. I guess bringing a new type of enterprise to the area is not seen as desirable for some reason.

[bailey]

No, they are completely and totally CONNECTED to Detroit, because this is where they operate. If they had moved to Portland, they may have utilized a "Made in Portland" campaign. I just don't understand how advertising that you are local could ever be considered a bad thing, just because you could be somewhere else. Isn't that kind of the point?

There is a difference between advertising you are local, scrappy, start up doing well by doing good and pretending to be one.

AGAIN, this is not to say they should pack up and leave because they aren't detroit enough. I'm glad they decided to invest here. Just saying the only reason they are here is because a venture capital firm did some market testing and thinks gritty detroit street cred will sell more watches.

[bailey]

I guess ruin porn is more to their liking. Certain posters even seem to think that training workers to do a new type of skilled assembly is a bad thing. I guess bringing a new type of enterprise to the area is not seen as desirable for some reason.

Their entire marketing campaign makes GENEROUS use of ruin porn. Doing so, was the entire reason behind the offense taken in the article that set this thread off.

This idea that people would be surprised by how human and artistic and talented Detroit's citizens are if they just came and visited is ludicrous and emblematic of a new type of gentrification, one that seems even more insidious than what has occurred in, say, Brooklyn. Shinola and other entrepreneurs market themselves as white knights, swooping in to save the noble savages. They help assuage the guilt associated with gentrification and consumerism by pointing out how strong and proud and culturally important the natives truly are—that simply by choosing to be in Detroit, Shinola is somehow better than other companies selling similar products. Shinola is using my city as its shill, pushing a manufactured, outdated and unrealistic ideal of America

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Yes. Thank you. That is the point. They are completely and totally unconnected to Detroit outside of the marketing campaign.

Renovating work space, employing workers, opening a store in the city, makes a business unconnected to Detroit? Why?

What makes a business "connected" to Detroit? If the owners grandpa came up from Kentucky in 1922 to work in an assembly plant?

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

There is a difference between advertising you are local, scrappy, start up doing well by doing good and pretending to be one.

AGAIN, this is not to say they should pack up and leave because they aren't detroit enough. I'm glad they decided to invest here. Just saying the only reason they are here is because a venture capital firm did some market testing and thinks gritty detroit street cred will sell more watches.

The only reason GalaxE Solutions is here is because they think Detroit street cred will sell more outsourcing. "Outsource to Detroit"? They are not a scrappy start up doing well by doing good. The horrors!

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Their entire marketing campaign makes GENEROUS use of ruin porn. Doing so, was the entire reason behind the offense taken in the article that set this thread off.

I'd like an example of how the marketing campaign uses GENEROUS use of ruin porn. I think that exists mostly in your head.

Their website actually lists where all components are from.

http://www.shinola.com/customer-serv...resources/faqs


"Our hope is that we can cultivate a cottage industry of suppliers who will move their operations to Detroit in order to supply us with needed components."


Perhaps you should start a cottage industry to supply them. I hear Detroit needs some more "scrappy" start-ups after all.

Also from the website:
"Why not accept that manufacturing is gone from this country? Why not let the rust and weeds finish what they started? Why not just embrace the era of disposability? And why didn't we buy a warmer coat before we moved here?
Through three Detroit winters, we’ve asked ourselves these questions. And worked not to find our answer, but to build it."

Gee, I guess they are trying to look like they've lived here forever....

[Honky Tonk]

Here's another good idea that's going to bring jobs and publicity to Detroit:

https://www.facebook.com/detroitpackard

JEEPERS, I can't believe I've been here my whole life and NEVER heard of them! @ least they're honest about the meat from Taiwan "Artisan crafted Coney Island Hot Dogs hand assembled in Detroit, Michigan. We are more than just a hot dog company, we are a lifestyle brand." I want to shape MY lifestyle after a Packard hot dog. I just hope Poughkeepsie doesn't gain notoriety, I'd hate to think what the job loss would do to Detroit.

[bailey]

I'd like an example of how the marketing campaign uses GENEROUS use of ruin porn. I think that exists mostly in your head.

I was talking about the orginal article's author's opinion.

Their website actually lists where all components are from.

yes I know.

"Our hope is that we can cultivate a cottage industry of suppliers who will move their operations to Detroit in order to supply us with needed components."

Perhaps you should start a cottage industry to supply them. I hear Detroit needs some more "scrappy" start-ups after all.

I'm perfectly happy working for a large, evil, multinational corporation. Also, maybe instead of dropping 15 million on a TriBeCa NYC flagship store, they could assist/entice a few to move/set up here?

"Why not accept that manufacturing is gone from this country? Why not let the rust and weeds finish what they started? Why not just embrace the era of disposability?

Ok, look, THIS is the point. If that's the mission statement, then why not actually make the watch movement here then? The "hard" part about the watch is the movement. the guts. its the stuff that separates a fossil[[who uses the same firm for their innards as Shinola does) from a Rolex. It's the "manufacturing" that we don't do here anymore that they claim they are doing. They are a texas firm assembling stuff here after the parts were manufactured elsewhere.

You say that is a distinction without a difference... fine. I think that is a bit like saying Toyota is an American company because it has plants here and uses domestic suppliers.

For the 5th? 6th? fucking time though.... I don't care that they assemble the stuff here. I'm happy they are here. However, I'm also saying there is no reason they are here other than they liked the marketing aspect of it. Which again... is just fine. I'm just kind of put off by falseness of it.

In 60 years or so, a grandfather will finally be able to pass down an American wristwatch.

I mean, is it american watch when the movement is swiss and the dials, hands, crystal and case are chinese? Again, as I said before, maybe "made in ____" is never true in the age of globalism, but if you're going to slap it on every piece of your marketing material and claim it as a company ethos...maybe it should be?

[noise]

Actually, many posters on this thread have made the point numerous times that the watches or bikes are being "assembled" and not "manufactured" in Detroit, so its a major part of the thread to others, even if it may not be to you.

The other part of the thread seems to be that its inappropriate to highlight the skill of the Detroit workers in a "marketing" campaign. I tend to think that anything that portrays Detroit in a good light, and makes people think that perhaps its a good place to do business is not a bad thing. I guess ruin porn is more to their liking. Certain posters even seem to think that training workers to do a new type of skilled assembly is a bad thing. I guess bringing a new type of enterprise to the area is not seen as desirable for some reason.

I think context is lost on you, which makes any sort of reasonable dialogue a lost cause. This is entirely related to their phony marketing. Nobody has claimed they are a bad thing outside of the context of their marketing. Quit being disingenuous.

[noise]

Renovating work space, employing workers, opening a store in the city, makes a business unconnected to Detroit? Why?

What makes a business "connected" to Detroit? If the owners grandpa came up from Kentucky in 1922 to work in an assembly plant?

It's simply co-opting an image to sell goods. There's not a genuine connection. They're a Texas company who purchased a New York name and set up one of their many locations in Detroit.

[noise]

As bailey, myself, and many others have said...we're glad the company is doing business in Detroit. We'd just prefer they didn't market themselves dishonestly.

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

I think context is lost on you, which makes any sort of reasonable dialogue a lost cause. This is entirely related to their phony marketing. Nobody has claimed they are a bad thing outside of the context of their marketing. Quit being disingenuous.

Their marketing is not phony. They are using a skilled Detroit workforce to make a quality product. They make the point that skilled workers make a good product, and that Detroit at least used to be known for such a workforce, and is therefore a good location to start a business that makes things. They make the point that there is no history of watchmaking in Detroit, but they might be starting one. They note on their website that they have been in Detroit for all of 3 years. They note on their website that assembly is 100% in Detroit, but that the parts are made elsewhere [[although at one is listed as Michigan made) and that they try to source as many parts domestically as possible. They also say they'd like to develop local suppliers. They were very upfront that the big clocks were not made in Michigan as nobody does that, but that they used the only domestic firm that makes them. And now these interlopers are partnering with Midtown Detroit on a new green alley project! The nerve of them.

Sometimes Detroiters remind me of folks in some insular little town in the boondocks where everyone knows everyone, and anyone else is an outsider even after being there for 5 or 10 years.

If a new tech firm locates to Silicon Valley and says they did so because its the tech center of the world, and markets itself as being in Silicon Valley, nobody says its disingenuous. Nobody hoots or hollers that they have ties to some other city or state. But maybe that's one of the differences between an area like Detroit, where people have forgotten what its like to live somewhere that people want to move to and become a part of and claim as their own, and a place like California where that is the norm.

[noise]

Yeah, I know, you buy into it. We all know it. You don't have to keep repeating yourself and missing the argument entirely.

Not everyone is as easily taken and can see nuance. Some people are discerning. You'll have to accept that.

[Spartan]

Yeah, I know, you buy into it. We all know it. You don't have to keep repeating yourself and missing the argument entirely.

Not everyone is as easily taken and can see nuance. Some people are discerning. You'll have to accept that.

Could easily say the same in the other direction. Some of us are ok with it, some aren't. Doesn't seem like either side is very interested in being convinced otherwise.

[DetroiterOnTheWestCoast]

Yeah, I know, you buy into it. We all know it. You don't have to keep repeating yourself and missing the argument entirely.

Not everyone is as easily taken and can see nuance. Some people are discerning. You'll have to accept that.

I'm so glad you are so discerning, Oh Wise Poo-Bah of the Motor City.

Quite an interesting non-response to my Silicon Valley analogy.

Brian Dickerson made an interesting comparison [[in interview in the link I posted earlier) between his first news job Miami where 2 of 400 workers were native of Miami and the newsroom in Detroit where he was the ONLY non-Detroiter. It speaks volumes about Detroit's provincialism.

[RO_Resident]

Dammit, now people are going to think that Shinola, Detroit, and bikes are somehow related.
http://www.bicycling.com/ride-maps/f...14-_-ride_here

Talked to some of the Shinola folks at the Detroit Bike Expo a few weekends ago. Seemed like nice people.

[DetroitPlanner]

Dammit, now people are going to think that Shinola, Detroit, and bikes are somehow related.
http://www.bicycling.com/ride-maps/f...14-_-ride_here

Talked to some of the Shinola folks at the Detroit Bike Expo a few weekends ago. Seemed like nice people.

They got to be nice. The prices they sell those for seem outrageous! $2-$3k is a ton of dough for most folks.

[Honky Tonk]

Are the frames Titanium, Fiber Carbon, or something else that's special? That's an AWFUL lot of money for a run-of-the-mill bike.

[noise]

Could easily say the same in the other direction. Some of us are ok with it, some aren't. Doesn't seem like either side is very interested in being convinced otherwise.

Agreed, but those who aren't are constantly having their argument misrepresented by those who are.

[noise]

Quite an interesting non-response to my Silicon Valley analogy.

Really? You've ignored every counter analogy in this thread! Unbelievable.

Furthermore, your "analogy" wasn't analogous enough to make a response. If the SV company was doing the same thing as Shinola? It would be just as disingenuous, obviously.

[noise]

Are the frames Titanium, Fiber Carbon, or something else that's special? That's an AWFUL lot of money for a run-of-the-mill bike.

No. They're nice handmade steel frames from Waterford Bikes in Wisconsin. They're not "performance" bikes, which can get close to $10K.