To which you're like, no way! Companies still do that? In this corrupt, greedy, outsourced, BushCo-ravaged age? An age when even all-American icon Levi's are now made in foreign factories? And American Apparel can still make a profit? Why, yes. And, according to this BusinessWeek article, he pays his largely Latino factory workers nearly twice the minimum wage, and gives them health insurance, subsidized lunches and paid time off to take English classes on the premises. He works not at all to hide his predilections, and most people claim he has never done anything that hasn't been fully consensual, out in the open. He encourages a sexually open workplace atmosphere.

It was founded and is run by a talented and sexually nutty and increasingly notorious, mutton-chopped, '70s-happy 36-year-old dude named Dov Charney, one of the more unique and controversial and libidinously open CEOs in all of corporate America, unafraid and unabashed and just a little greasy (click here to see a video interview with Charney, via Lou Dobbs).Īnd Dov, well, he happily indulges in consensual sexual relationships with members of his staff, and he uses tons of raunchy language in the workplace and posts old shots from Penthouse magazine up in his stores to complement the racy retro hipster club-kid design aesthetic, all despite a slew of sexual-harassment lawsuits now winging his way, fast.Ĭharney takes many of the company's beautifully racy ad photos himself.

Have you heard of American Apparel? Spreading fast, it is, opening multiple open-aired clean-cut brand-free stores across the nation and across five countries and they are, apparently, a big hit with hot urban chicks and lesbians and DJs and club kids and sporty types and grungy '70s-inspired dudes who like to wear floppy hair and multiple layers of really simple clothing covered by nicely made hoodies of various primary colors, all without actually thinking they're attaching themselves to a brand or a logo or a 'look,' even though, of course, they very much are.Īmerican Apparel. Makes those tired Victoria's Secret catalogs look like your dad's 1982 Playboys. And she makes tube socks look more orgasmic than a tongue vibrator strapped to a wood nymph in a vat of liquid chocolate sighs.Ĭan we not love the irony? Socks and tank tops and porn stars? Can we not love how the Religious Right must be gnawing off its own arm in appalled self-righteous indignation at the whole thing, even as it secretly buys Phoenix's movies in bulk?Īnd can we not love the sweet dichotomy of a company that touts its sweatshop-free humanitarianism and simple brand-free design aesthetic as a major selling point in one breath, while in the next it happily hires multitalented orally gifted gluteally accomplished porn starlets to complement its already quite stunning array of young, nonprofessional models, most of whom are 'real' girls and some of whom are even the company's own employees? Natasha! Nour! Xochielt! Oh my. She is nubile and good and makes angels want to drink heavily and belch.

Lauren Phoenix, down-home and wholesome and girl-next-doorish and star of such family-friendly video delights as 'Anal Delinquents,' 'Angels of Debauchery,' 'Assploitation 2' and 'Assploitation 4' and 'Full Throttle Anal' (among many, many others), now appearing in casual ads for inexpensive brand-free all-American clothing. This is the latest salvo, the next iteration of advertising savvy and no-holds-barred guerrilla marketing to make you go, oooh. To which we can only say: God bless them.

Oh my star underwear