Dependable Eddie

His signature is on the SUV next to you at the traffic light, the car seat your well-off college friends strap their kids into, the sunglasses your doctor wears, the Compaq Presario notebook your co- worker is still paying for and the wallpaper in your neighbors' tastefully decorated living room filled with his special-edition furniture.

And don't forget your closet full of his clothes.

But for millions of devoted Eddie Bauer customers, the man behind the label -- the son of Russian immigrants who built an empire off personal fishing tips and a talent for stringing tennis rackets -- remains a mystery.

"I didn't even know he was a real guy," says Scot Swinburn, a devoted Eddie Bauer customer for more than a decade. Pulling out his wallet, Swinburn explains that after purchasing several designer- label pocketbooks for more than $100 each, Bauer's simple, $30 model had lasted longer than any of them.

"The name doesn't mean that much to me, but if I can depend on the product, that's what matters," he says, while still admitting that the name comes attached with a certain amount of status.

"When we first drove home in our Eddie Bauer-edition Ford Explorer, my relatives were like, `Well, you've really made something of yourself,'" says Swinburn, laughing.

And there's no debating the appeal of the Eddie Bauer brand among the well-to-do yuppie set. Label-conscious new parents proudly show off their complete Eddie Bauer baby product line -- from diaper bags to strollers to fold-up play yards -- while casually cautioning you not to leave drink rings on their new Eddie Bauer coffee table.

It's all part of an ingenious 81-year transformation from a scrappy sporting goods shop to a multimillion-dollar "lifestyle brand."

"We recognized that hunting and fishing was about 10 percent of customers' lives, but their lives were so much more than that," says Jane Loeb, Eddie Bauer's manager of public relations. "We look to fill all of their lives.

"You don't just wear us on the weekends. You can wear us to work or the theater."

But in the fervor to own all things Eddie, few lifestyle-minded folks have bothered to find out anything about the man whose signature is emblazoned on everything from their prescription eyewear to their knit boxer underwear.

So gather 'round the air conditioner, settle back and listen up. (Much of the information comes from "The Legend of Eddie Bauer" by Robert Spector, Greenwich Publishing Group Inc. 1994.)

Bauer, in the beginning

Born Oct. 19, 1899, on Orcas Island in the coastal waters of Washington State's Puget Sound, Eddie was the last of six children. His family had arrived in Seattle a year after a fire devastated the town in 1889, spurring a huge rebuilding effort and providing plenty of work.

The Yukon gold rush of 1897 had transformed Seattle into the gateway to the Klondike and prompted the Bauers to relocate to Orcas Island.

Young Eddie developed an interest in hunting and fishing by observing the continuous stream of hunters attracted to the island's abundant wildlife and fruitful surrounding waters.

At 14, shortly after his parents separated, Bauer was faced with being the man of the house. He got his first part-time job at popular Seattle sporting goods supplier Piper & Taft, where he earned a whopping $18 a month.

His go-getter attitude and his prowess for fishing, a hobby the store heartily endorsed by providing him equipment, made him popular with customers. It wasn't long before Bauer's duties were expanded from washing windows and running errands to making fishing rods, custom golf clubs and selling tackle, shoes and outdoor wear.

But a devastating motorcycle accident in 1917 left Bauer incapacitated for four months, restricting his activities when he returned to work at Piper & Taft and resulting in his layoff the next year.

He was rehired just two months later, this time as a manager of several departments and was responsible for promoting the store in advertising and window displays - a skill he would put to good use later.

He also developed a formidable skill in racket-stringing, a trade he promoted by stringing tennis rackets in the store's front window as well as regularly hitting the local courts with one of his best rackets to draw in new customers.

After winning a national contest for speed and proficiency in stringing tournament-caliber rackets in 1919, Bauer decided to leave Piper & Taft and go into business for himself.

The Eddie explosion

After leaving Piper & Taft, Bauer had several odd jobs until he decided to lease a small space inside a sporting goods store down the street from his former employer. There, with only a two-year business course under his belt and a personal net worth of around $25, he opened his own racket-stringing business.

Eddie's reputation as an outdoorsman made him popular with Seattle sportsmen as well as local socialites. His racket-stringing enterprise thrived.

He eventually opened his own tennis and golf store, Eddie Bauer's Sport Shop, just down the street, and eventually expanded into firearms and fishing tackle. He even purchased items wholesale at Piper & Taft to resell to his own customers, until the store started taking him seriously and began drastically underselling tennis supplies in an attempt to quash the most lucrative part of his business.

But his customers remained loyal, and Bauer moved to a larger space in the late '20s, increasing his inventory in all areas and expanding into badminton and squash supplies. He offered locally produced fishing tackle and introduced outdoor clothing and sleeping bags.

His skills as a fisherman and hunter remained a constant source of new business, with Bauer helping introduce new trends, such as saltwater sport fishing, to expand sales. It was also about that time that he met Christine Heltborg, known to everyone as "Stine," a personable young woman whose considerable passion for outdoor activities eventually inspired Eddie to propose.

They were married in 1929 and stayed together the rest of their lives.

The stores continued to expand and required larger spaces, but Bauer never left the same block. In 1934 he moved into a 6,600- square-foot space, where he introduced snow-ski equipment and leased the entire back wall to a company specializing in mountain-climbing gear.

Bauer's next innovation would come after he nearly froze to death during a fishing expedition. He developed a down-filled jacket, quilted to keep the down in place, something no one at the time was doing.

Bauer secured more than 16 different U.S. design patents, which allowed him to dominate the quilted clothing business, a technology that would prove invaluable to the military when the United States entered World War II.

Bauer's Seattle headquarters became ground zero for a massive national campaign to outfit the armed forces with cold-weather equipment, and his insulated flying suits created enormous good will and loyalty among military personnel.

His was also the only private manufacturer's label permitted to appear in government-issue gear during the war, a coup that would prove enormously lucrative after the war.

The stress of wartime production and running several businesses took a toll on Bauer's health, prompting him to bring in William F. Niemi to oversee the company through postwar times. Though Eddie Bauer went out of the retail business in 1951, mail-order sales remained steady.

The first Eddie Bauer catalog was released in 1945, and that business kept the company strong through 1970, when it opened its first large store in downtown Seattle.

While Bauer remained a powerful figure to the company, he sold his interests to Niemi in 1968. In 1986, at the age of 86, Eddie Bauer died, just two weeks after the death of his wife.

The company continues to thrive, with five distinct Web sites and more than 600 stores in the United States, Canada, Germany and Japan. Laurie Givan, Eddie Bauer's advertising and marketing manager for licensing, says that while the Ford Motor Co. introduced Eddie Bauer- edition vehicles in 1983, the bulk of the licensing came about in the last four years. Since then, the company has joined with Imperial Home Decor Group for wallpapers and borders, Signature Eyewear for optical eyewear, Lane for home furnishings, Cosco, Goldbug and Baby Boom Consumer Products for infant accessories, Compaq Presario for a Pentium III notebook, and American Recreation Products for camping equipment.

But what would a guy who spent the better part of his life fishing and hunting think of having his name attached to wallpaper and laptop computers?

"One of the things about Eddie is that (he) was totally committed to providing whatever customers wanted," Loeb says. "He totally believed in innovation.

"He listened to his customers, and he moved on things. He would have been very interested in computers, because he believed in being where the customers were."

Loeb recalls a Bauer interview in which he said that "to meet the wants and needs of our customers and friends, our product lines and our services would change to meet these needs."

So as customers' needs continue to change, what future goodies might we expect with the EB sig?

Apart from announcing plans to expand the outdoor and home product lines, the Eddie Bauer folks remain tight-lipped about specifics.

Might we suggest Eddie Bauer checkbook covers?

Copyright 2001 Cowles Publishing Company
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.