Nestled among the theaters and galleries of Brooklyn’s trendy Greenpoint neighborhood, Drama Club is a general store for the local cosmopolitan crowd. Its street-level windows frame perfectly curated displays of gorgeous perfume bottles and carefully curated shoes. Behind the hip neon sign on the door, owner Jack Sachs’ retail background and acting and filmmaking career come into play.
After more than a decade at Barneys New York, OAK and Bird, Mr. Sachs decided to open the doors to his own boutique in early 2017. Drama Club is meant to be an homage to his past in luxury retail, while creating poland number for whatsapp a space that welcomes those looking for a new, unique experience.
We sat down with Sachs to learn more about his financing experience with Lightspeed Capital powered by Stripe , why he chose his POS system before he even decided on his store’s decor, and his passion for telling stories through the products he sells.
Can you tell me about Drama Club and why you opened this store?
I spent most of my early years working for other people, in their stores here in New York. Over time, my career actually became about managing other people’s stores. More specifically, my resume says I was the Director of Retail Operations for an independent, multi-brand fashion retailer. My background was in operations, sales, and people—in short, serving the product and the customer. I really enjoyed doing that, and I felt like there was a way to translate those skills, showcasing the product and telling the stories that interest me most, into a smaller-scale environment.
It’s been about five years now since I opened a small neighborhood store, with the intention of showcasing some of our favorite brands from around the world. The majority of our revenue comes from the physical store, but the website is a crucial part of that business: not only for the growth potential we see, but also because consumer habits have changed over the last 10 years.
We knew that integrating our brick-and-mortar store and online store was essential, even for our local customers. I constantly encounter people who live around the corner but shop online before coming to the store. My goal is to create an online shopping experience that matches our unique in-store experience, to serve the interests of both the products and the customers.
You moved to New York in 2005 as an actor and filmmaker. How did that influence your career in retail?
I think any experience you have before you work in retail that prepares you to appreciate a customer presentation and to be in service of the story you're telling can only make you better at what you do. I can make some mundane analogies between audience members and customers, but it's the same thing if you've worked in a restaurant or any other field where you're dealing with customers.
The business of pitching a product to a savvy customer is the same as storytelling: it’s about building a relationship with people and doing it in a way that’s compelling. If you can’t do that in a way that’s compelling and you don’t enjoy telling good stories, I wouldn’t recommend retail. On the other hand, if you love people and things, and you’re passionate about communicating the truth about products and services, I can’t think of a better place to be, especially with everything that’s happened with the COVID-19 pandemic.
Last spring, a lot of retail was deemed non-essential, and I don't necessarily disagree with that. But when I saw people coming back into the store and picking out their products with such joy, it was a real testament to their resilience. I think there's something about the consumer goods space that gives us an incredible legitimacy. Particularly for us, because we genuinely care about the quality of the design, the integrity of the production time, and the products that we offer.