A New Home
Finding the new home of Western Costume was only the first step of the monumental task of moving the company. In April of 1990, all 3.5 million costumes and props, plus the more than 10,000 books from the library, made their way to a new home in the San Fernando Valley. Both locations remained open for business as usual during the day; at night, truckloads of costumes were packed and transported across town. Two years later, after successfully orchestrating the relocation to North Hollywood, Eddie Marks replaced Paul Abramowitz as president of Western Costume. Then, in 1995, Bill Haber bought out the other members of the Trinity Group to become the sole owner of the company.
Modernize
Marks took steps to modernize the business. He hired Frank Allegro to overhaul the uniform department, and invested over $1.5 million dollars into improvements, including the purchase of up-to-date uniforms from every branch of the US military and many major law enforcement departments.
A Broader Network
Bill Burchette took over theatrical rentals, which accounted for roughly thirty percent of the business, and was charged with pursuing a broader network of professional and academic theaters as clients. Western’s overall staff dropped from around 100 in 1988 to just over 50 in 1993. For most of the company’s existence, Western Costume employees pulled all the costumes from stock for clients; beginning in the early 90s, designers and costumers could comb the racks themselves for the pieces they needed. Over the course of the decade, Western collaborated on films like Jurassic Park, The Shawshank Redemption, and Apollo 13, and worked on popular television shows like Dr. Quinn: Medicine Woman. They also made stage costumes for superstars Madonna and Janet Jackson.
Marks recognized the importance of continually refreshing the rental inventory
As costumes are rented and re-rented, they begin to show their age. In addition, much of the existing stock comprised garments that were made directly for films, rather than actual vintage clothing. Marks recognized that tastes had changed, and that many designers preferred authentic period clothes. During his 30 years at the at the helm, he purchased eight private collections of vintage clothing, including the collections of Helen Larson, Patty Norris, and Dorothy Weaver; Weaver’s collection alone comprised 40,000 pieces. To make room for these new acquisitions, Western briefly operated an outlet store, selling older stock items directly to the public. In 1993, they sold a large portion of their archive, the “Star Collection,” in three successive auctions with Butterfield and Butterfield.
Technology
As the new millennium loomed, the computer-savvy Marks brought the historic company into the technology age, replacing certain antiquated, analog methods. Western boasted a laser color copier in its library and offered a service digitizing client’s costume breakdowns. The company also became the beta customer for Rental Tracker Pro, a software that digitally tracks rentals. Previously, every item had to be written up by hand before it was rented. Starting in 1998, as items were rented, they were given a barcode and put into a database, making rentals easier to track and quicker to process. RTPro is now an entertainment industry standard.
RTPro
