Tony Bennett died. That’s why I need to give advice to car salesman and anybody in luxury retail who wants to be taken seriously.
Before we go any further, spend 4 minutes of your life saying farewell to the guardian of the Great American Songbook. My first CD was Tony Bennett, and I got a tingle the first time I heard Ralph Sharon tinkle the keys back from “Indian Summer” to “Autumn Leaves.” I say farewell, Tony Bennett.
The Unplugged album is the reason I got into Elvis Costello, too. I named a daughter after one of his songs, as Mr. Bennett did with “Joanna.” I wonder how many people he has impacted?
I think he now has a chance to posthumously impact car dealerships. Here’s my take.
I can’t find it on the Internet, so I am saving it for posterity here: Tony Bennett once told the British music magazine Q that the secret to his timeless fashion was the lapels: never too thin, never too broad.
See the two photos, one early, one late, for proof. He even looks good in whatever color that jacket is. …
My wife used to tease me about my conservative dress: navy blazers, tweed jackets. But I followed Bennett’s advice: Don’t be trendy, be timeless, classic.
And for me, I had a financial reason: I didn’t want tacky clothing to be a distraction to clients!
Yes, that has happened before: I remember a millionaire client looking me up and down with a mild flare in his eyes before greeting me.
Should we be looks-obsessed? Judge people by their looks? In the Bible, James warns me not to. But in the instance described, my clothes preceded me. And, as Shakespeare has Polonius tell his son Laertes in “Hamlet,”
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy,
For the apparel oft proclaims the man,
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are of a most select and generous chief in that.
Clothes may not make the man–but they proclaim him, as we have discussed on the podcast. I vowed never again to be distracted by worrying that a client was distracted by my appearance. I would avoid anything tacky.
What makes something tacky? Sometimes we know it when we see it. Such as, you know, the stereotypical plaid car salesman’s jacket. I give you the car badger, a dealership commercial that hit so true it spawned memes.
Something that was trendy and is now out of style: tacky. But of course some trends last, so that’s not the only thing to consider.
I am not fashionable, so all I have been able to do is to try to learn some basic rules: the grammar of dress.
For instance, Mom drilled this into me: Athletic socks are for athletic shoes. Don’t wear white ankle socks with your oxfords.
But there are many others. If you are on Twitter, your feed may have been taken over by Derek Guy, a an incredibly knowledgeable men’s fashion writer. I’ll let him take over.
He spells out the grammar of men’s suits using the King of Spain as an example. (Mom, you don’t read the blog, but many of these rules I learned from you!) It’s worth reading the entire thread.