THE perks at Fashion Week are taking a weird turn downmarket. High-powered fashion editors and retail merchants – who in seasons past have hauled off gift bags of Victoria’s Secret lingerie, Calvin Klein perfume and Estée Lauder cosmetics – will be treated this year to McDonald’s, Budweiser and Jell-O.
“As you can imagine with the economy, this season it was very difficult to find a sponsor,” says Daniel Silver, co-designer for pricey men’s label Duckie Brown, which will be serving McDonald’s “McCafe” coffee backstage today at its Bryant Park runway show.
“We feel so fortunate to have gotten McDonald’s at a time like this,” adds Silver. “They’ve been so generous and nimble.”
As demand for high-priced fashion tanks, budgets for runway shows have been slashed. While designers haggle for lower tent-rental fees and hire fewer models, traditional sponsors like beauty companies have become less prone to doling out cash.
“That’s opening the doors for designers to take on quirkier sponsors,” says p.r. consultant Alison Brod.
Menswear label Monarchy will be doling out samples of K-Y Brand sex lubricants at its runway show tomorrow. The brand hopes the samples “will not be lost on the couples in attendance!” according to a spokeswoman.
“I’m sure if you look hard enough, you’ll find some designer who’s being sponsored by a plastic surgeon or a funeral parlor,” says James Laforce of Laforce & Stevens, a p.r. firm specializing in the fashion industry.
Elswhere, designer Yigal Azrouel has raised eyebrows by partnering with eBay.
“I understand your point,” Azrouel says in response to the charge that the Web site’s second-hand bargains are a bane of an industry struggling for profits.
But eBay “is a marketplace for everything,” he adds, noting, for example, that Proenza Schouler has sold its clothing on eBay.
Likewise, some insiders were surprised to see Lori Goldstein – a top fashion stylist for Vogue and other highbrow publications – slated to appear on home-shopping network QVC, hawking from the tents a new “collection” of clothing items priced as low as $30.
And Costello Tagliapietra, whose dresses routinely carry four-digit price tags, will be serving Budweiser backstage at its runway show tonight. “It will be cans, of course,” designer Robert Costello tells The Post. “We gotta keep it real.”