Founder’s Letter: Kingpins Quarterly Publication Launch
It’s Kingpins Amsterdam time again. We are stoked and ready to go and do the best we can to satisfy exhibitors and attendees. We hope you have a great experience. And now on the precipice of our event, we have news to share.
On Wednesday October 18th, we will officially launch our new publication, Kingpins Quarterly. Everyone at the show in Amsterdam will receive a physical copy and of course there will be a digital version of the publication where you can download stories now.
As the name suggests, we plan to publish quarterly, with new issues dropping in time for our shows in Amsterdam and New York.
We hope Kingpins Quarterly will be something you enjoy and take your time reading. Naturally we hope you like it — visually, viscerally and intellectually. In our perfect little world, our dream is that you love it.
One of the inside jokes among the Kingpins team (at least we find it funny) is that to work at Kingpins, you must be totally “comfortable” with public humiliation. Whenever we try new things, there’s always a potential to win or fail. We have failed many times over the years when we attempted to innovate. But each time something goes wrong, we absorb the hit and do our best to fix it for the next time. Years ago, one of our exhibitors had a booth in NYC at a new venue where the floor in his booth tilted about 30 degrees. He complained (rightfully) that the booth was not workable or at least deserved a discount. We had never noticed the floor before he complained because when we saw the venue it was a huge room, with a white polished-cement floor. To us the room looked beautiful and vast, but to him in his spot it was a nightmare.
Our new publication is like the white floor. We think it’s beautiful and we think it’s important. Our writers have no need to rush their stories and can write longer, more explanatory articles. In addition to the feature articles, there will be a section on facts about our beloved jeans industry for both Europe and the USA. We will look at how many jeans ship per month to the USA and Europe and from where.
We also want to reassure our media partners that we are not trying to step into your shoes or step on your toes. Instead, our goal is to expand the conversation. We are a denim organization that simply wants to explore topics of great importance to the industry and provide a platform for more voices and perspectives. We plan to stay away from daily news and leave that to the experts. We also hope to find ways to collaborate. Kingpins was built on the idea that all exhibitors can co-exist with each other in the same room and that at the end of the day, they can have beers with each other and our customers. We believe to our core that competition is not a problem, rather its fun and the more the merrier. In the end, what is really important is that customers love our industry and love what we all do.
Happy October!
-Andrew Olah
