Former “Baywatch” actress Melissa Biggs recently designed and launched a women’s basic line, PGD Style.
Her first shipment, to boutiques such as Ma Jolie and Fred Segal boutiques, sold 100,000 units.
“I’ve always been obsessed with T-shirts,” Biggs said. “I’ve been on the hunt for the perfect white T-shirt for the past 10 years. There’s a lot out there, but nothing was ever perfect for me.”
On top of that, when she did find a shirt that seemed right, it would fall apart after one washing. So Biggs developed a supima cotton weave that stands up to the washing machine and doesn’t pill.
“These are perfect,” she said. “They’re sexy basics.” Her line also includes some pants and dresses.
The model and former “Baywatch” babe received a crash course in merchandising while working for a sportswear distributor she was modeling for. Soon she was sitting in on meetings with buyers from Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and adding her two cents.
It was not long after that when Biggs was dealt a serious blow. She was diagnosed with Alpha-1 Antitrypsin deficiency, a protein deficiency that causes respiratory complications such as emphysema at a young age and can result in liver disease. She was told that treatment would cost $20,000 a month and that she wasn’t sick enough for her insurance to pick up the tab.
“It was basically a death sentence,” Biggs said.
Biggs found pharmaceutical company CSL Behring, which makes one of only three drugs on the market designed to treat her condition. She also connected with the Caring Voice Coalition, an organization that works with individuals afflicted with the same disease as Biggs to help them pay for the medical treatments insurance doesn’t cover. She became the poster child for the cause, literally, and now sits on Caring Voice’s board.
She still found time to work on her next business, which would become PGD, and enlisted the help of Guess Inc. Chief Executive Paul Marciano, a close friend.
“Melissa is a talented designer and friend,” Marciano said. “I’m very happy to have been able to help her in getting well and to see her now trying to help others.” Biggs now designs a private label for Guess.
Biggs is donating a portion of her profits to Caring Voice. Although the line is already carried in 82 stores, the official launch is May 16, when she’ll host a kickoff event at the Beverly Hills Tennis Club.
PGD Style is a division of Biggs’ MacyJane Enterprises.
Working Overtime?
An Orange County Superior Court Judge has denied class certification of a lawsuit against apparel manufacturer BCBG Max Azria and its parent company AZ3 Inc. last month, ending four and one-half years of litigation.
Three former BCBG store managers sued the store in 2002, claiming that they had been unfairly classified as managers exempt from overtime pay. The three plaintiffs eventually grew to a class of 1,000 former and current employees, who sought $50 million in back pay.
“We hope that this case will serve as a model for defendants who believe that they have properly classified their employees and who no longer want to pay nuisance settlements to resolve frivolous law suits,” said Scott J. Ferrell, lead attorney for the defendant.
In fact, out-of-court settlements have been the norm for overtime lawsuits. They can drag on for years and the potential for a company to face a multi-million dollar judgment is very real. Overtime law suits have become something of a cottage industry in the California Plaintiff’s Bar since 2000, when California’s “Eight-Hour-Day Restoration and Workplace Flexibility Act of 1999” went into effect.
John Quisenberry, a trial attorney who focuses on overtime work but was not involved in the BCBG suit, said the classification of managers is at the heart of many overtime cases. Usually, he said, there are assistant managers under one main manager at a store. Since assistant managers and managers don’t perform the same function, it’s problematic to lump them into one category, Quisenberry said. Companies can get around that by convincing judges that these mangers do different jobs at different times.
Even though it would make life more difficult for a plaintiff lawyer, Quisenberry said he wishes the court would make things more clear.
“I wish a judge would say ‘I agree with you, Employer. I want you to come back in here in court every two weeks and say which you managers you paid overtime and which you didn’t,'” said Quisenberry.
Still, BCBC was celebrating last week. “We could not be happier with the court’s decision as we knew from the outset that these claims were completely without merit. BCBG will continue to vigorously defend any baseless lawsuits,” General Counsel Maryn Miller said.
Staff reporter Emily Bryson York can be reached at (323) 549-5225, ext. 235, or at
[email protected]
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