Must everything be political? Even pants?
Levi Strauss & Co. wants people to vote. Well, at least some people. They are pushing a voter registration drive with the message, “Don’t just talk about it. Vote about it.” At a glance, it’s clear that it is liberal voters the company is trying to encourage. Watch the campaign video a little longer, and you might even get the notion that Levi’s doesn’t want any customers who are not yet fully awokened.
Among the participants is a CNN talking head who has had this to say to African Americans who support Trump for his actions on criminal justice reform: “Shame on you. Period.”
There is a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter “Youth Vanguard.” (It seems that the name “Young Pioneers” was already taken.)
Also present is singer, actor, and producer Miguel Pimentel. His commentary on President Trump includes wearing a T-shirt at last year’s Coachella music festival with the slogan “How Nipsey Before Trump?” (Rapper Nipsey Hussle had recently been shot dead.)
There are some actors I’ve never heard of, some activist professors (are there any other kind?), and a poet.
Notably absent is anyone identifiable as a Trump supporter. I asked Levi’s whether there was anyone in the campaign who might make Trump voters feel welcome wearing Levi’s jeans. A spokesman pointed to another initiative, “Time to Vote,” as evidence of the company’s bipartisan bona fides. That effort encourages companies of every sort to give their employees time off on Election Day.
A glance at Levi’s Facebook page suggests there are those who don’t like being lectured by the corporate Left: “Thanks for encouraging me to vote for President Trump,” reads one recent sarcastic post.
Other posts suggest Trump supporters are in no mood to buy Levi’s jeans. And that may be just as well with the San Francisco-based corporation. Uncool customers, after all, diminish the brand.
Levi’s has no small opinion of its cool quotient. The company proclaims, and not just in the new youth vote campaign, that wearing its dungarees has radical revolutionary meaning. It may be deluded about the sociopolitical import of its imports, but I’ll take the company’s word for it. And that’s where I part ways with it, not out of political pique but because I’m not interested in being a billboard for somebody else’s manifesto.
So where to get some new jeans to wear?
The pro-Trump posters on the Levi’s Facebook page take particular relish poking fun at the company’s pronunciamentos about the oppressed and downtrodden. They suggest there is hypocrisy in this given that Levi’s abandoned almost all of its U.S. production in favor of distant places where the labor is cheap.
They have a point. But who makes jeans in America anymore? Not the big brands. But there are some boutique shops making bespoke pants for the working man. I tried a pair this week, and it was a transformative experience.
Todd Shelton menswear is based in New Jersey, and that’s where its seamstresses sew denim cut to fit each customer. They begin by sending you a few sample pairs to get a general fit. You tell them what adjustments to make, and before long, you have made-to-measure jeans.
I like everything about Todd Shelton. I like not only that the jeans are made in America but that they’re made well. I don’t even mind Shelton’s “ethical manufacturing” claims because it has to do with its standards for making the product — not some free-floating urge to lecture. You pay a premium (a pair costs $275), but the jeans themselves are almost worth it, and the absence of a sermon puts them over the top.
I don’t know what Todd Shelton’s politics are. The company may support establishing anarchosyndicalist communes for all I care. It makes and sells terrific jeans without guilting the customer. Good for Todd Shelton.
Now, I’m just going to have to figure out how to scrounge up $275.
Eric Felten is the James Beard Award-winning author of How’s Your Drink?
