One of the funniest article I have seen recently, basically bankers willing to use their prospective clients products to demonstrate that they should be awarded the deal, which frankly makes no sense at all...The article includes a number of ridiculous examples including the following:
"The attorneys at Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP, which advised Men's Wearhouse on its recent deal to purchase rival Jos. A. Bank, shrugged off Armani and Zegna in favor of $600 suits by Joseph Abboud —a once-prestigious brand now owned by Men's Wearhouse"
"Ditching their pressed shirts, suits and dress shoes, deal teams at several banks showed up at meetings wearing form-fitting yoga pants, track suit tops and sneakers to convince Lululemon's management that they would be committed to the underwriting assignment—and to the spirit of the brand. But yoga isn't for everyone. The stretchy bottoms were tight, remembers one banker who pitched the company. "It was pretty embarrassing, actually," says the banker, who remembers leaving his hotel the morning of the pitch and feeling goofy as people in business suits walked by. Even though they were determined to wear the pants, the bank didn't get a piece of the deal""Fashion faux pas can be costly. Karen Goodman, a managing director at Financo, recalls driving to a pitch to sell a business for a different shoe retailer. Ms. Goodman says she usually wears the products of the client she is pitching. But on her drive over to the meeting, she realized she had on a competitor's kicks. "It was 8 a.m. and stores weren't open," she laments. Financo lost the deal to a competitor and later learned, from a board member, that the snub had to do with the not-so-fancy footwork."
You can check the full document on today's WSJ
Haha. This is so embarrassing/humiliating.
All I could think about while reading this article was all the finance tools that take themselves so seriously and think their lives are so glamorous.
On another note... the banker chick has a hell of an apartment: http://www.elledecor.com/home-remodeling/design-solutions/tailored-to-p…
on the one hand, I get it, I wouldn't want someone wearing a competitor's product in a sales meeting (like if a consultant trying to win our business was using an Edward Jones pen).
on the other hand, if you're wearing yoga pants to a meeting, you have no dignity.
Bankers at beauty parades for IPO roles are like WSO kids approaching summer intern interviews. Both are so desperate for the gig, they end up making ridiculous conclusions about how they can find some edge/"make a connection".
When was Joseph Abboud "Prestigious" ?
The article did mention people losing deals because of wearing wrong clothing.
Easier to blame losing a pitch on "wearing the wrong clothing" than admitting your pitch was crap.
delete
Actually it came from the client. Read the article next time.
"Fashion faux pas can be costly. Karen Goodman, a managing director at Financo, recalls driving to a pitch to sell a business for a different shoe retailer. Ms. Goodman says she usually wears the products of the client she is pitching. But on her drive over to the meeting, she realized she had on a competitor's kicks.
"It was 8 a.m. and stores weren't open," she laments. Financo lost the deal to a competitor and later learned, from a board member, that the snub had to do with the not-so-fancy footwork."
Bankers often lie. Particularly about this sort of thing.
I don't see the push back here. This is beyond obvious.
You aren't winning deals because of the best pitchbook. Everyone basically has the same ideas / numbers - its not rocket science. Its about connect with the management and making the feel comfortable around your team. I'd much rather have a guy selling my company/product that understands it than someone that doesn't.
In William Cohan's Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World, he tells a story about how Hank Paulson got on his knees and begged Christopher Flowers (Head of a Japanese Bank) to be a part of the firms IPO. Flowers apparently looked at him said no and shut the door in his face
We acquired a company whose main clients were the big cell phone companies and during dd and beyond when we wanted to meet with top execs at the mobile operators our portfolio company told us just do not show up at T with a VZ phone and they just had extras sitting around that they have to us. But I'd kill myself before I put on yoga pants for a meeting. Switching cell phones is one thing but no yoga pants, ever. There isn't an underwriting or m&a few that's large enough.
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