Kitsch Is Key to Apparel Makers Branding Effort - Mexico’s NaCo Appeals to Hispanics, and Macy’s, by Mocking Latino Tackiness - (more on the NaCo T-shirt “Brown is the new white” pulled from Macy’s apparently not because it offend Latinas as headlines read but because of a conservative anti-immigration website)

“NaCo got its first U.S. break with a national retailer last week when 17 Macy’s stores in Texas and Atlanta began stocking eight women’s $25 T-shirts. (That happened after someone forwarded to one of the store’s buyers, a Latina, a New York Times travel article about Mexico City directing visitors to go first to a “cheeky streetwear” NaCo boutique in the trendy Condesa district and buy a T-shirt.)

Macy’s, however, quickly found that not everyone is amused by NaCo’s sense of humor. Its T-shirt with the fashion-parody slogan “Brown is the new white” drew immediate fire from a conservative anti-immigration website, generating e-mails to Macy’s threatening a boycott and online rants about racism and immigrants trying to take over America (one poster pointed out a possible link between Macys’ red-star logo and communism). Fox News did a story, and Macy’s pulled the “Brown is the new white” shirt.

Dean Schwartz, president-CEO of Naco USA, is unperturbed and said, “Macys has taken it in stride.” “

So my post about the article entitled “Macy’s T-Shirts Found Offensive By Latina Shoppers” was incorrect. However, reading through the blogosphere quite a number of Latinos were offended. I just wonder if they were influenced by articles like these or are they really offended. Interesting how this spun out. I mean I know that my opinion was definitely impacted by the mistaken headline.

Mistaken Headlines can be found at:
Macy’s Drops T-Shirt After Possibly Offending Hispanic Community
Macy’s Says ‘No Mas’ To Racial T-Shirt
Macy’s T-Shirts Found Offensive By Latina Shoppers

You can see how this spread across the web by looking at a Google search of “macys Brown Is The New White” and a Google Blog Search with the same term

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