Make Gallifrey Great Again Hat Generator
Donald Trump'south hats take quickly go a signature totem of the 2016 campaign, a kitsch magnet that serves ironic hipsters and sincere supporters alike. The blood-red-and-white caps are emblazoned with the real manor mogul's oft-repeated slogan, "Make America Dandy Once again."
But look around the manufactory flooring where these hats are beingness made by the thousands, and you'll find faces that don't seem to fit into Trump's America.
Yolanda Melendrez is one of them. Melendrez, an immigrant from United mexican states who was brought to the U.s. by her parents when she was a infant, has worked at the Carson-based Cali-Fame headwear company since 1991.
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"When we beginning got the order [for the Trump hats], I said to myself, 'Merely look until he sees who's making his hats. We're Latinos, we're Mexicans, Salvadoreños.'"
Melendrez, 44, started out equally a machine operator, stitching the seams of baseball caps. She at present works as a lead on the floor, roaming every bit she checks on the flow of work, supervising other sewing machine operators and embroiders. She became a citizen when she was 20; her parents are permanent residents. Melendrez was 14 when she had her first child, and the job has helped her pay rent and put food on the table for her kids, she says.
Workers run up together hats on the mill floor of Cali-Fame in Carson.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
One recent Sat at the Cali-Fame manufactory, almost 20 miles south of downtown Los Angeles, dozens of employees, virtually all of them Latino, were working away while machines whirred all around them. Some peered over glasses as their deft easily assembled i hat afterward another; others swept scraps of fabric from the floor. They were surrounded by stacks of freshly minted camouflage-print caps, with the presidential hopeful's all-capital letter-letter hope emblazoned on the front in orange.
Brian Kennedy, president of Cali-Fame, says that when the Trump campaign asked his family unit concern to make the now-famous hats, he knew he would need to address his workers.
"I said to them, 'Nosotros're not political. We're here to work,'" Kennedy told the Los Angeles Times from the 2d floor of his factory, the steady sound of sewing machines in action below him. "And I haven't gotten whatever negative comments."
The hats, known best in the signature red with white font, have inspired hipster manner trends, Halloween costumes, a make-your-own-Trump-hat generator and even a short-lived rumor they really were fabricated in Red china.
(They weren't, Kennedy assures).
In fact, unlike some Trump-branded lines of habiliment sold nationally, this headwear is legitimately made in the USA, creating jobs for people who hail from the very places Trump has at times disparaged.
The company employs about 100 people in a 30,000-square-foot warehouse. About fourscore% of the company's workforce is Latino, Kennedy estimates. He says that every worker has his or her immigration status verified.
The merchandise was a portion of the more than $825,000 the Trump campaign dropped on bumper stickers, T-shirts, hats and other promotional gear, the largest category of Trump'due south spending outside of travel.
The hats have seemingly been a boon for Trump'southward campaign too. Most of the caps sell for $25 each and appear to take boosted the billionaire'south small donations column, making donors of those who purchase them, ironically or non.
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Kennedy and his blood brother, Tim, Cali-Fame's vice president of sales, have been reluctant to wade into the political fray. Brian Kennedy, who initially declined to be interviewed, says he's turned down dozens of media requests.
A visit to the manufactory on a weekday suggests the concern might accept easily remained bearding, save for campaign finance records: The windows were black and no signs of life were obvious early 1 evening, except for a few modestly appointed cars in the parking lot.
Kennedy and his blood brother bristled at the news coverage they received for weeks afterward entrada finance disclosures were released.
Melendrez says she tries her best to avoid it as well.
She says she's heard some of the things Trump has said about Mexican immigrants and Latinos similar her, but she attempts to ignore them, even equally headlines about Trump'south proposals to build an impenetrable wall on the border of Mexico and his comments writing off some Mexican immigrants as rapists and criminals continue to boss coverage of the Republican front-runner'southward campaign.
When Macy'southward cut ties with Trump over his remarks, which the visitor said were "inconsistent with Macy'due south values," Trump publicly accused the retailer of supporting illegal clearing.
"A lot of what he says about Latinos is non correct," Melendrez says with a shrug merely as a cablegram signals the terminate of her Saturday overtime shift and workers line up to clock out. Spanish punctuates the air every bit the machines sputter to a cease.
But Melendrez doesn't pay the media reports much mind. She knows she has a job to do.
"Y'all know," she says, "he's giving u.s. a lot of work. Keeping u.s.a. busy.… It'due south a chore, I get paid to practise information technology and information technology pays my bills."
And for that, Melendrez says, she'south thankful.
Brian Kennedy is president of Cali-Fame.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
A spokeswoman for the Trump campaign did not return a request for annotate.
Although Kennedy downplayed the office Trump's orders accept played for his concern as the vacation season begins, several employees said this is the busiest November they've seen in years, with plenty of overtime piece of work to go effectually.
Kennedy says that since his begetter bought the business organisation in 1977, Cali-Fame has weathered ascent labor costs, employee downsizing, changing technologies and cutthroat competition from cheap overseas labor.
The factory is on the edge of an industrial commune that presses up against tight rows of neatly fenced unmarried-story homes. On the other side of the 710 Expressway and across the L.A. River is a country order and golf grade serving Long Embankment's nearby tony neighborhoods.
"To be a local manufacturer in the United States, there's so many challenges, not only in America but in California alone," he says while surveying the massive warehouse.
For decades, the company had its bread and butter in golf game tournament caps and other promotional headwear. The company has taken in other work, Kennedy says, such every bit embroidering fix-made shirts and sweatshirts, to help boost acquirement.
More than recently, the manufacturer has branched out into street habiliment and urban mode, launching a brand that has focused on supporting burgeoning clothing companies. Wood panels separate a portion of the warehouse for a showroom of sorts, allowing Cali-Fame to host an occasional sale. On a recent weekend, curious deal-seekers browsed straw fedoras and baseball caps of varying designs, only no Trump hats were in sight.
"The old cliche is that you coil with the punches," Tim Kennedy says. "We've done that many times, and nosotros're constantly changing what we practise and how nosotros do things."
Brian Kennedy says his company has been making hats for Trump's golf game courses for well-nigh a decade, which is how he got connected with the campaign.
These caps -- "the v-panel trucker lid with string," Kennedy volition tell you -- have become a solid forepart-runner when it comes to 2016 campaign kitsch.
"It's a classic," says Tim Kennedy. "Everything comes total circle in the fashion concern. It'due south straight from Middle America to New York and Los Angeles."
For more than on politics in the Aureate State, follow me @cmaiduc.
For more than, go to www.latimes.com/politics.
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Source: https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-trump-hats-cali-fame-carson-20151124-story.html
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