TRIUNFADOR: Jeans Queen
— -- In New York City's Garment District, Lisa Rudes-Sandel sits in a spacious fourth-floor loft showroom with sunshine pouring through the windows onto a table covered with different colored jeans.
She picks up several pairs and runs her hand over them pointing out special features. "This is my basic style," she tells the buyer, setting a pair in front of her on table. "It's the one I began with."
Rudes-Sandel explains how all the jeans have four percent Spandex in them, more than is in typical jeans, which makes them more stretchy, form fitting and comfortable. "It's always the same fit," she says.
Rudes-Sandel, 43, is president of Not Your Daughter's Jeans (NYDJ), and is the first Latina to create and run her own jeans company. NYDJ is also the largest jeans company in the world run by a Puerto Rican woman. Her specially designed jeans, called Tummy Tuck Jeans, are targeted to women in their 40s and older who want a slimming, form-fitting look. They are among the best sellers in the industry.
When asked to sum up her success, Rudes-Sandel laughs and says, "You've come a long way, baby," quoting the famous cigarette advertisement.
She certainly has.
Rudes-Sandel was born into the world of fashion. Her father, George Rudes, was working in his family's successful textile business in Puerto Rico when he met María Teresa Colondres from the small mountain town of Adjuntas. They married soon after and started a family.
It quickly became obvious that little Lisa loved fashion. As a child growing up in San Juan, she was always tearing pages out of fashion magazines, like Bazaar and Vogue, and showing them to her father. "Can't you make this?" she begged him, holding up a page with a picture of a splendid gown.
Many mornings, she would burst excitedly into her parents' room while they were still in bed and put on pretend fashion shows for them.
Wanting to nurture his daughter's interest, George regularly took Lisa with him on business trips to visit clothes makers and managers of department stores in such places as San Juan's Plaza Las Americas shopping mall. Lisa always listened carefully to his conversations and tried to learn as much as she could. "There's nothing you can't accomplish," he would tell Lisa and his other two children, Leslie and Kenneth. "You have the talent. Go for it."
When Lisa was 12, the family moved to New York City and George let Lisa work part-time during the summer as a receptionist in the office. She didn't last long. By this time, George was manufacturing clothes and one day and angry customer called asking why his shipment was late. Lisa answered the phone and told her father what the man wanted without covering the mouthpiece.
"Tell him I'm not here," said George.
Lisa was confused and upset. "How can I tell him you're not here when you're standing right in front of me?" The angry customer heard the whole exchange and that was Lisa's last day working as a receptionist.
But Lisa learned from it. "That was her first lesson," recalls George with a smile. "How to deal with customers who are pressuring you when you've got a hot product and it's running late."
Two years after arriving in New York, George moved the family to Los Angeles to take advantage of the fast growing denim craze that was exploding there. George's timing couldn't have been better. His new jeans' business took off and he started offering jean jackets and other denim clothing. This led him to start designing and selling sportswear and before long he was known in the industry as the "King of Jumpsuits."
It was apparent to George that Lisa had an innate talent for fashion and he hoped that one day she might take over the family business with her brother and sister. She clearly knew how to put clothes together in a stylish way. "I knew she would be able to make clothing that appealed to people," recalls George.
While Lisa was in college, she accompanied her father on many trips to Europe to see the latest fashions. Her keen eye for small details, such as a pretty embroidery or beading work, impressed George and together they selected styles and designs and figured out how to apply them to their own designs.
Lisa found her father's advice to be invaluable. "Know your customer," he always told her, "and always give them what they want, even if it might not be what you'd wear. Don't design for yourself."
Lisa worked at her father's sportswear company, St. Germain, during summers in college answering phones, helping in the showroom and in sales. When she graduated, she went to the company's New York office and worked there full time. George treated his daughter no differently than any other employee and insisted that she learn every aspect of the business. She excelled in all her roles and in 1994 George retired and named Lisa the company's president, working closely with Leslie and Kenneth.
Lisa's biggest challenge came when she had to help navigate the company through the economic downturn that followed the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. People began avoiding shopping malls and other such public places that were feared to be possible terrorist targets. Many of the stores that sold St. Germain's clothes went out of business or sharply cut back on the amount of clothes they ordered.
Read more about Lisa Rudes-Sandel and how she helped save the family business by creating the jeans company, Not Your Daughter's Jeans. Pick up the December issue of Selecciones on newsstands now.