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01-12-2005, 11:38 PM | #1 |
YT 6000 Club Member Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Seattle, WA
Posts: 6,238
| [News] Yorkies in Vogue HIGH POINT — Ginny Wiltsey makes no bones about it. “Let’s face it,” she says. “Dogs were not made to wear clothes.” But that hasn’t stopped her from turning canine couture into a cash cow. It’s an online operation she calls Classy Sassy Paws. Since she began a year ago, Wiltsey is fast becoming the Donna Karan of doggie style. The rich. The famous. They all seek her out. They all trust her tastes. They all want their pets to be ... sassy. There’s the Doggy Diva line. The Sweaters Galore collection. And the all-important boa collar collection. Says Wiltsey with a Crest smile: “I love sassy.” In the doghouse It all happens from her High Point home. Wiltsey does the designs, and her mom helps make some of them. A mill across town takes care of the rest. Product moves like the Chuck Wagon Gravy Train. “I walk outta here,” Wiltsey says, “on Cloud 9.” So come on. Let slip the dogs of wardrobe. But first: Beware of dog. The dog. Barkbarkbarkbark. A 9-year-old Yorkshire terrier wearing a hot pink boa comes racing around a corner. Barkbarkbarkbark. Be afraid. Be very afraid. That’s Chelsea. She loves sassy, too. Grrrrr. Not far behind, as if holding an invisible leash, is her owner. One doesn’t just meet Wiltsey. Like one of those Times Square billboards, you sort of encounter her. Then you spend the next few seconds trying to assimilate the ocular overload. There’s the big, blond hair that has its own air space. The watch the size of a clock radio. The smile that crosses zip codes. And the list of other ingredients that constitute the goulash of her persona. Leopard prints. Open-toed high heels. Keeping it real. Younger men. Straight talk. “Take me or leave me,” says Wiltsey, 45, with the cloud of a recently extinguished cigarette hanging in the air like a London fog. “I like to be different. If I can dress to where I’m the conversation at your dinner table, right on.” Chelsea is her doggie doppelganger. “I used to dress her all the time,” she explains, taking the terrier into her arms. “I used a lot of tulle, a lot of patterns, a lot of” — here comes that word again — “sassy.” People started asking her where she bought the clothes. It got her wondering if there wasn’t a business in making them. That is, if anyone was willing to buy this stuff. And then it hit her: stars. They’re all about pimping out their pooches. Paris Hilton. Hilary Duff. Nicole Richie. And, way before them, the queen of bow-wow bling: Zsa Zsa Gabor. A chance meeting with one celebrity pet lover — Rhonda Shear of USA’s “Up All Night” fame — would open all kind of doors. “Next thing I knew,” Wiltsey says, “she wanted me to be her personal designer.” Running with the big dogs Beverly Hills, June 2004: pet fashion show. Classy Sassy’s clothes have gone Hollywood. Wiltsey scans the room, goes to her table and checks her vital signs. Seated there: Robin Leach, Lorenzo Lamas and Gloria Allred. The beautiful people. As soon as her designs hit the runway, she’s one of them. “The audience went nuts,” Wiltsey remembers. “I got a standing ovation. I could literally feel the heat from the flash bulbs. You’re like, ‘Wow, dude. What am I doing here?’” Selling yourself. Selling product. Selling ... sassy. Sharon Stone’s basic instinct was to buy something on the spot. “She came to the table and said my ideas and creations were just fabulous. That seems to be the word out there.” Teresa Heinz Kerry wanted a lap mat, maybe envisioning its use someday on Air Force One. Word got out. Orders came pouring in. Wiltsey has been working like a dog ever since. Every dog has its day She’s her own boss now, and it feels good. Real good. There was a time not too long ago when Wiltsey, hard as it is to believe, used to work for The Man as — brace yourself — an accountant. So there she was with her big hair, big jewelry and horn-rimmed glasses looking all sassy on the outside. On the inside, though, Wiltsey was miserable. She was the proverbial square peg stuck in a round hole. Then, one day, a client made an observation that would become the push she needed. “She said to me — and I’ll never forget this — ‘You’re like a rose out of water. You’re capable of so much more. You’re stagnating your creativity.’ “That stuck with me.” These days, Classy Sassy’s bottom line is as bloated as Jabba the Hutt and feasting on every opportunity. A CBS writer wanted her stuff for an episode of the Rob Lowe drama “dr. vegas.” That paragon of mass merchandising, Target, now carries Classy Sassy products on its Web site. “That account’s jammin’, man,” Wiltsey says. “I’m playing with the big dogs now.” So to speak. But there’s always more trips. More shows. More deals. It never ends. “I get overwhelmed at times,” she says. Yeah, it’s a dog’s life. http://www.classysassypaws.com |
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