Q & A: Episode 4

Transcription

Hi I'm Kirby Allison, and we love helping the well-dressed take care of their wardrobes. Thank you for all of your comments and questions that you guys have posted on our YouTube channel. After reading them all, I've selected five of my favorites that we're going to feature in today's Q&A video. Each of these individuals I've selected will receive a complimentary pair of our Sovereign Grade shoelaces as a token of our appreciation for your participation in our channel.

Our first question is from shahtel and his question is "What are the differences between the Saphir Medaille d'Or and the Saphir Beaute de Cuir. The Saphir Beaute de Cuir is definitely better than any other commonly available polish here in the United States. I mean it's leaps and bounds better than a Kiwi polish because it's still using an all natural pine-based solvent that's not using a petroleum based solvent like what you find in most common polishes, but the difference between this and the Medaille d'Or is really in both the concentration and quality of the ingredients used. Both of these are very good. One is just a higher concentration of the things that matter that over the long run just makes it that much more effective polish at conditioning, nourishing, and taking the best care of your shoes as possible. There's also other very subtle differences. You know the Saphir Beauty Cuir uses an almond oil but then the Medaille d'Or uses a shea butter. Now they both have the same effect of conditioning the leather, but one is just a more potent effective conditioner than the other. The Medaille d'Or also contains a carnauba wax which is a higher quality hard wax that again, helps produce that high shine much more effortlessly. The Medaille d'Or also contains a higher concentration of pigments which is especially important in the cream polish because it's that concentration of pigments that is going to produce that re-coloration that is necessary to maintain the patina of a shoe. Thank you shahtel, for your question, we look forward to sending you a pair of our Sovereign Grade shoelaces as a token of our appreciation.

Comment number 2 is from CraftCrafted. His question reads: How did you decide to start your own business? Better yet, was there any specific reasoning behind going into men's fashion? Family background, etc.. I would love to know the background of this obviously well-established business. The Hanger Project literally started as The Hanger Project it was just simply The Hanger Project and so it was just my dinky little side business that I ran at night or on the weekends while working a full time job. And it wasn't until November 2007, that an article was published in The Wall Street Journal called The Catalog Critic comparing Hanger Project hangers, our luxury suit hanger to three or four other brands of suit hangers. And we were given this enthusiastic best overall, and that's really kind of what launched us, allowed me to quit my job, and begin running The Hanger Project full time. So the first year after that, I felt like I was a rock star, the second year was me realizing I had no idea what I was doing, the third year was me panicking, and then the fourth year was when I really started to work and building this business. And so it's been ten years now which is incredibly hard to believe, but it's been a lot of fun and has really allowed me to pursue my passion of helping the well-dressed take care of their wardrobes. The Hanger Project at its core has really been more about helping people learn how to take care of things that are well-made so that they could invest in and enjoy things that were well made and well crafted. And so that's really our future. You know as The Hanger Project continues to grow and evolve, it's not just helping support the well-dressed taking care of their wardrobes, but it's really going out there into the world and finding items of the highest quality and sharing those items with all of you - our customers. Thank you CraftCrafted, for asking that question, that question was actually asked on our previous Q&A video, and so here we are featuring that now. And I really look forward to sending you a pair of our Sovereign Grade shoe laces just as a small token of my appreciation for your participation.

Third question today is from Walter G and he asks: why is it that you don't offer cedar hangers? Well we do have a few cedar accessory hangers on our website like the one here that is for belts. But the reason that we don't offer cedar hangers for any of our garment hangers is that in order for cedar to be aromatic, it has to be unfinished. It's the only way that it's going to have any of its aromatic properties which is really the only reason you would ever want to buy a cedar hanger. So in order for a cedar hanger to be aromatic, it has to be unfinished. And the problem with an unfinished hanger, is that it can very easily splinter and snag your fibers on your clothing. And for that reason, we really don't sell any unfinished hangers. All of the hangers we have here at The Hanger Project are finished either with a gloss finish or a satin finish, but finished to ensure that absolutely no splintering can occur that could damage or ruin any of your clothing. You know so really think about it. I mean every single time that you put your garment on the hanger, it slides across the entire length of the hanger. Now if it's unfinished, it's going to be you know snagging and really wearing at your fabric almost like sandpaper. This is a rough edge right here, and that could absolutely ruin your fabric. Now our beautifully finished hangers here at The Hanger Project have an incredibly smooth finish so that as you put your garment on your hanger, it just glides right on there without any risk of damage at all. One of the things that I do after I put my garments on my hanger is to just shake it a little bit to just allow the suit jacket to recenter or to its natural center point. Although great for something like an accessory hanger that you really don't have to worry about coming into contact with any fine clothing, we absolutely unequivocally here at The Hanger Project do not recommend using cedar hangers for any of your garments. Thanks Walter for your question, I hope this answers it. And as a token of our appreciation for your engagement on our channel, we're going to send you a free pair of our Sovereign Grade shoelaces.

Question number four is from a Richard Venezia: Curious as to what cigar you smoke. Also I take my single malt scotch in a leaded cut crystal glass. Thank you for all of your valuable time to provide a great volume of information. Regards Rick. Rick, it is always a pleasure to eet gentlemen with a common and shared passion. One of the things that I enjoy most about a good cigar and a nice glass of scotch is that most often I'm enjoying it in great company with good conversation. If you're ever passing through Dallas, I'd love to have you at the office for a cigar. Now to your question as to my favorite brand of cigars. Let's go pull something out. So as some of you may have noticed if you watched our office tour, this credenza in the corner is actually my humidor. So one of the things you might be able to tell is that without question, my favorite brand of cigars is Bolivar. I would say that absolutely my go to cigars are the Royal Coronas which is a nice medium to full bodied cigar and just a really good 30 to 45 minutes smoke. I mean this is my go to. It's you know, if I smoked cigars daily, it'd be my daily smoke. I've never had one of these that I didn't enjoy, and one of the things I love most about Cuban cigars is I just find that, you know, they're still the best cigars in the world and they don't leave any type of residue in your mouth after you smoke, so you can smoke one and the next morning you don't wake up feeling absolutely terrible. Now my second favorite format from Bolivar are the Belicosos Finos which is a little bit larger than a Corona and has a torpedo into it and again, absolutely great cigar. I've never smoked this cigar with anyone that didn't love it, it's an approachable cigar. It's smooth, it warms up very nicely, and again, it doesn't overpower the mouth. Now one of the things that I absolutely enjoy is aging my cigars, and so I've got several boxes of these in my humidor. But I also have some other special boxes that I enjoy aging like this Liberador which is one of the larger formats from Bolivar. It's probably one of my favorite cigars I've ever smoked. Now recently, you know, people have seen a lot of the Cuban cigar formats have gotten larger, and so this is a much larger ring gauge and a much longer cigar than what traditionally you would find out of Cuba. But again, an incredible smoke. This box, you know, I've clearly have for a while, because I'm just down to three. So this box right here is from July 2015. So this already has almost three years of age on it. These two boxes, let's see another July of 2015 and then this one is November 2015. So you know, I guess relatively young boxes, two years. You know, I'd like to keep them and age them at least five years before I really dig into these boxes. Thanks Rick for your question. I look forward to sending you a pair of our Sovereign Grade shoelaces and really appreciate your participation here on our channel.

Our next question, is from J.T. Wang on our "How to Strip a Mirror Shine" video. His question reads: Kirby, another great video, if the rest of the shoe is OK, should only the toe box be stripped with Reno'Mat. I've not tried putting Dubbin on the shoes not stripped down. Would you know if that would work okay, or should I Reno'Mat then Dubbin? Thanks. I don't know if anyone else has this problem, but I only get cracking on one shoe. So his question is that if you're removing the mirror shine, should you used the Reno'Mat just on the toe cap or on the entire shoe? And my answer is really, the Reno ' Mat is something that we just recommend using for the entire shoe once or twice a year. You know, it's just meant as kind of like a spring cleaning. We recommend it in our presidential shoe shoeshine video. But if all you're doing is just trying to remove the build up of the hard waxes from a mirror shine so you can start over, I really just recommend using it on the toe cap. You know, the Dubbin should work fine on the rest of the shoe, provided that there's not a significant wax build up that would prevent the Dubbin from being absorbed into the leather. If you're using the Saphir Medaille d'Or products, and primarily using a Cream Polish for the rest of the shoe, you really shouldn't have to worry about having to use the Reno'Mat before the Dubbin. So the only thing that I would recommend is just being careful not to apply the Mirror Gloss anywhere on the shoe that is going to flex or bend because that will lead to cracking and so if you have a crease, maybe across the top edge of your toe cap, when you're applying in the mirror shine, just be careful to come just directly underneath that. J.T., I hope this helps. Really appreciate your question. I look forward to sending you a pair of our Sovereign Grade shoeslaces.

Thanks again for all of your questions and comments. I'm really enjoying this Q&A; series because it gives me an opportunity to really answer in greater depth a lot of the questions that I'm already answering when you ask them on the YouTube channel. Remember, I really enjoy getting back to as many questions as possible on the channel, so if there's anything that we can do to help you better take care of your shoes or if you have a question, don't hesitate to ask it in the comments section. I do try to get back to those as many as possible. Sharing my experience with you guys is really one of the highlights of my business today. And I have absolutely enjoyed what this YouTube platform has allowed us to do. If you enjoyed this video, give us a thumbs up and please subscribe to our channel and turn on your notifications by clicking the bell to the right of the subscribe button so that you know whenever we release new videos. And of course, please visit hangerproject.com where we have the largest most comprehensive collection of luxury garment care and shoe care accessories in the world as well as many other incredible products for the well-dressed. And while you're there, subscribe to our newsletter to receive notifications of new product launches, promotions, as well as a weekly digest of all the videos we publish here on this YouTube channel. I'm Kirby Allison, and we love helping the well-dressed take care of their wardrobes. Thanks for joining us.