Not all pregnantly promising comeback stories dance giddily to fairytale endings — and so it was this weekend at the smacked-down Holy Grail Shoe Store in downtown Los Angeles.
The master plan seemed designed for a strictly modern landing that, unfortunately, did not materialize.
Here is the outline:
• A new, pocket-sized business struggling to gain its sealegs is pillaged a week ago Sunday by drunken rioters celebrating the Lakers basketball championship.
• Community activists, led by Earl Ofari Hutchinson, organize and dash to the store’s rescue. A sophisticated communicator, Mr. Hutchinson, in consultation with the father-and-son owners, draws up a promotion plan. He organizes a media conference that attracts at least six television outlets.
• Seven-hour Saturday promotion is ballyhooed.
Sadly, Saturday passed uneventfully. What had been billed as a classic, old-fashioned turnaround, stranger helping stranger, rather fizzled.
Upon further consideration, perhaps it would have been too perfect for this small, family-owned business to have essayed a miracle turnaround in six snappy days?
It had exactly the right ingredients for the kind of warmhearted, neighborhood-rescue story that makes people stand up and cheer.
But this is real life.
When the 29-year-old proprietor Richard Torres’ Jr. optimistically flung open the doors of the Holy Grail Shoe Store at 12 noon on Saturday, the people did not respond.
“Let’s say it was more symbolic than profitable,” he told an early Sunday afternoon visitor.
He looked a little disappointed, but he said that it was just a blip on the path to recovery, not a barrier.
Even if the crowds didn’t flood Holy Grail — the one store in its block without an iron gate, previously deemed too expensive — the explosion of publicity conveyed the most crucial message.
“We didn’t get the kind of huge turnout we were asking for,” Mr. Torres said. “But the good thing was (thanks to wide television coverage), we got the word out that we are back.”
In the Beginning
A year ago last January, Mr. Torres’ father, Richard Sr., came to the southwest corner of Pico Boulevard and Flower and purchased a thousand-foot, fairly square space that had been, in the jargon, a dump, typical of the previous neighborhood. It was not a place where family or friends would feel comfortable or desired.
Today, it is different.
Surrounded by residential and commercial neighbors benefitting from the gentrification movement, the Torreses’ purchase now seems like a good business decision.
In recent years, the welcome, clunky arrival of the two gigantic emporiums, the Staples Center and the Convention Center, washed the neighborhood’s face clean overnight.
That definitely was an attraction for the Torreses in building their upscale sneaker business from ground level.
According to Richard Jr., Holy Grail is one of only three stores of its kind on the West Coast — acquiring, on consignment, hard-to-find sneakers, and then selling these rarities — as in finding the Holy Grail — to the public.
Temporary Setback
A week ago last night, rampaging rioters broke in, stole “the vast majority” of the coveted sneakers of imaginative color and design, and also destroyed some of Holy Grail’s business equipment.
The drunken young men ripped out computers containing precious sales records.
But the Torreses were only on the floor momentarily.
With losses estimated at possibly $100,000, no one knows yet how long it will take the family to fully recover.
“The most important thing for us to do,” said Mr. Torres Jr., “is to keep working. Hard. There is a lot of work ahead of us, months and months.”
Like his father, Mr. Torres speaks softly. Not too high. Not too low.
Somberly surveying the tall gray walls and partially restocked shelves, he said:
“You look at all of the work we have put into the store in the last year and a half. It’s like beginning again at square one.”
Just Extra Work
When the hooligans violated Holy Grail last week, Mr. Torres said the vandalism “did not discourage me. But it sure did give me a lot of work to do.”
Being a consignment store rather than a standard retail operation complicates Holy Grail’s recovery.
“If we were a normal business,” said young Mr. Torres, “it would be easier. We would collect the insurance money and re-purchase the goods. It might take just a few weeks.
“But in this case, working with consignment, we have to reorganize because we have more than a hundred consigners we work with.
“Trying to get all new consignments is time consuming. Somebody came in Saturday with 10 pairs of sneakers. Then we got a phone call from someone who wanted to drop off three or four.
“In the meanwhile, though, we are losing out because there isn’t nearly as much inventory as there was before.
“Being that there is an 80 percent-20 percent break on consignment, it is going to take awhile to get our monthly sales back to normal. Won’t be overnight.
“Hopefully before Christmastime.”
In this age of electronic wizardry, Holy Grail Shoe Store’s reputation has exploded far beyond its downtown neighborhood and America’s shores.
Mr. Torres said he has received emails of encouragement and inquiry from as far away as Costa Rica and the U.K.
Last seen, he was hoping to have the store’s website, holygrailgoods.com, operational by today.
Mr. Torres answers questions at his email, info@holygrailgoods.com
