The Recession Not Only Hit the Oscars, But Also the Afterparty. Yikes.

I have been pumped about Oscar Sunday ever since I left the theatre in the fall after seeing Angelina Jolie in Changeling. I told my roommate, “well, that was fun. I just saw Angie win an Oscar. Awesome.” Yes, I refer to her as Angie. No, we aren’t friends. Only in my dreams.

Anyway, my mind quickly changed after seeing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Slumdog Millionaire, and finally my favorite actress Kate Winslet (and winner of best actress as of an hour ago, gasp) in the Reader.

While sitting on my couch in my sweatpants, I could only imagine the gown I would wear if I was on Brad Pitt’s arm, or what I would say to Ryan Seacrest’s annoying questions. I also floated off into a land where I held an exclusive invite to the Vanity Fair After Party.

Normally, the party is an extravagant, to say the least, gala filled with the recent winners, their dates, and any famous celebrity you would die to lay eyes upon. I’m sure it still will be, minus the normal extravagance. Last year, the writer’s strike forced Vanity Fair to cancel the famous party. So this year, they were ready to show what everyone had missed the year before, and then some.

However, our good friend the recession got in their way. According to an article from the Huffington Post, Graydon Carter, the editor-in-chief, announced that “the party will be a much more intimate affair than in years past; we’re going to scale back the guest list considerably… it will be a cozier, more understated event. And one with familiar décor — given the current economy…”

Not even the year’s most celebrated celebrities will get a larger than life party. Clearly, this recession is affecting all of us.

yes. yes. yes.

kate. you're just great.

at risk of sounding cliché.

i'm obsessed with marc jacobs. i'm obsessed with his collection. i'm obsessed with his face.



also, rodarte as well? who knew.



new york fashion week = life.

Give Saks Some Slack.

Picture a sample sale or trunk show at an upscale department store if you can. It usually entails a room full of women, draped in their fur coats and weekender-esque purses done up and looking their best while perusing amounts the newest releases of their favorite designers. Saks Fifth Avenue, a mecca for fashionistas and the like for hundreds of years, used to be a place buzzing with people looking to spend their hard earned dollars. Now, the aisles are more bare and their prices are slashed, due to their poor performance.

I used go to Saks when I got a bad grade on a test or felt a little edgy, looking for a pick-me-up. I would usually end up walking out with some nail polish or a few samples a salesgirl would give me after taking pity on me and my sad face. But I cannot even bring myself to go in anymore. It hurts my heart to even think about looking, because if rich people with careers cannot afford it, I certainly am no where close.

Department stores, especially Saks, are doing the worst of the whole retail industry during this economic slump. WWD, a leading fashion news publication, reported that department stores cut 8,600 jobs just in the month of January alone. In fact, Saks recently lowed their credit rating from "stable" to "negative," which means their company is not likely to get further investment.

Not only is their backing at risk, but 1,100 of those 8,600 lost jobs came from inside of the once booming department store. They have cut nine percent of their workforce total, according to Reuters, who also reported they will reduce their capital spending by 50 percent this year, to about $60 million, from 2008. In other words, big huge yikes.

Not that $60 million sounds like that small of a budget. I can only imagine what I would do with $60 million. Probably go to Saks...

However, not all is lost. To draw in customers, perhaps like us poor college students, they are drastically slashing their prices and putting everything on sale. During my birthday weekend in early January, their sale racks were a whooping 80% off, which is like the apocalypse in the world of Saks. According to a lengthy article in the Wall Street Journal, their strategy quickly became slash the prices before any other retailer does, to gain whatever business is left out there.

I pray it will work. While I do love actually actually being able to possibly afford something in the store besides a measly item from the cosmetics department, it only means big trouble in the long run.

Photo by: Richard Drew/AP

McDonalds Saves the Day?

These days, the real difficulty after waking up in the morning is not surviving the commute, but attempting to find an uplifting news article. Sure, there are the typical ‘cats dress up in costume’ or ‘dog saves local woman’ stories that everyone loves. However, if you have pulled into a McDonald’s drive thru or looked at their stock recently, you might not find such a bleek, depressing story.

The Chicago Tribune calls the road trip stitch ‘recession-resistant,’ proving that it is one of the only companies doing well in these difficult economic times. After it’s stock fell last year, McDonalds reported an income tax benefit and sales rose 5 percent the United States.

However, their success reaches beyond just sales and stocks. The golden arches can be found in nearly any place you can visit, making them “the best-run major international company in the world,” according to Jim Cramer, a well-known market analyst. While double cheeseburgers certainly do not compare to Italian food actually eaten in Italy, the basis of their appeal has yet to change.

Also, Forbes mentions that the real key to their success is empathy. They understand the current situation of the world, especially the United States, and are doing their best to keep their company’s practices simple and their french fries delicious.

In a place where merely bringing up the name “McDonalds” normally gets a dirty look and a scoff at best, some fashion designers showing collections this coming week at New York Fashion Week are singing a different tune. The company’s success has fueled them to aid beyond their own company and help financially back new designers attempting to make it big. Of the 200 designers showing at Bryant Park, roughly half of them are new on the scene, causing them to run into problem when people do not want to shell out the big bucks for clothes made by people of which they have not heard.

For example, one of these new designers named Duckie Brown gained McDonald’s financial support by promoting their new McCafe coffee products backstage during the show. They also have program during some of the shows where they will publish some of the designers ‘McStories.’ At this point, these 100 plus designers have no problem promoting any kind of product to get their lines off the ground…

…maybe just not feeding McDonalds to their models. That would be the real travesty.