Branded For Success

Has anyone offered to buy your name and revive the label?
There have been people who wanted to buy my name. I said no. I'm Mr. Galanos. I didn't believe in the continuation without me. I never branded my name. Everything is branded today, and that drives me crazy. It's your name. I always felt, "Look, you are who you are, and if you sell your name it doesn't mean anything anymore."

What was the size of your company at its height?
A couple of million dollars.

Tiny! Most major luxury fashion brands today do more than $1 billion a year in sales. Do you think a company like yours—a small producer of American-made clothes for a niche clientele—could still exist today?
It'd be difficult. You'd have to have other things like perfume, accessories. You'd have to become a brand. I could have had everything: stocking, shoes. I said no. Today, you have to do it.

You had a wonderful ambassador in Nancy Reagan. How did you first meet her?
I met her when she was a movie star and I had my shop in Beverly Hills. She was known as Nancy Davis back then. Since she was a petite woman, size 6; she bought the samples for a lower price. Then she married Ronald Reagan, and when he became governor, she asked me to do her Inaugural gowns, for both terms. And I was thrilled to do it.

When he became president, I did both her Inaugural gowns again and most of her evening gowns and wardrobes for state visits. When she went to Prince Charles's wedding, I made all those clothes. Nancy was very pretty and had a beautiful figure and was really spectacular in evening clothes. I went to the White House several times, once for a big dinner for French President Fran?ois Mitterrand, and she walked down the hallway holding his hand, and I was really very proud.

© 2007