For months, the marquee outside the shuttered Flatbush Avenue Pavillion Movie theater said "Aliens Mourn Waning Fashion." Now we know why: a brand new American Apparel outpost in the old theater space on the north end of Flatbush straddling Park Slope and Prospect Heights. Both neighborhoods pride themselves on a lack of chain retailing, with only a few noteworthy exceptions.
While locals should find the politically correct American Apparel marketing spin less objectionable (made in the U.S.A., etc) than some chains (if not little green men), a chain is a chain is a chain. The new American Apparel store represents the first trendy chain incursion on north Flatbush.
When all is said and done, this is the third American Apparel to open in the Cobble Hill-Carroll Gardens and, now, Park Slope-ish area. Now, about the overtly sexual nature of the American Apparel marketing campaign: the new message reads "A Moonshine Liver Even Though AA is Raging" and suggestively pursed lips look down on Flatbush.
· American Apparel, An Immigrant Success Story [NPR]
· Living on the Edge at American Apparel [Business Week]