Club Obi Wan

I've not posted for quite some time now, but I thought that I'd come back with some news. Many of you may or may not remember me, I was the one who went to HJ last June( Wait a minute.. a year last June!!) and bought a HJ. My story was about the level of service. I went in dressed smartly and pondered with the staff over which hat I should buy. Eventually coming to rest on the poet style next to the black and white photo of Harrison Ford as Indy. I made no mention of the Jones link and they in turn only brought up the subject once I'd handed over my money saying "and you could also go as Indiana Jones in fancy dress if you want as these were the hats from the film!".....or words to that effect- memory fades. Well earlier this month I was back to meet the wife from work and as her office is a matter of crossing the street and walking a couple of hundred metres, I went to the shop . I immediately noticed that they had had a move around internally and so I had a walk around. This time I was not smart and was infact unshaven. I was in fact eyed around the store as if I would steal something. I continued. Now we come the reason for this post. I looked at the hats. Where was the poet? Where was the Indy hat?! In fact, where was the photo? No matter how hard I looked, they were gone. I must admit that I then just walked out, but it seems to me that over the years they have gone more and more away from THE hat to now doing away with it altogether.
On a plus side, My HJ has travelled with me far and wide, last to Kenya on safari and is still fantastic. Older, dirtier, sat on countless times, but still in shape, lovely and now a great old worn in friend.

I still remember your story buddy
I've heard that the poet has a new run (since they claim to have found the ORIGINAL blocks). Maybe they just took the picture away from the wall or it's hidden in the basement.
Btw, please post some pictures of your adventures with an original HJ hat!!

First of all, good to see you in these parts again, stranger!

Second of all, to just speculate on your recent visit, one has to wonder if maybe, JUST maybe if Indy 4 contracts ARE being awarded, and HJ did NOT get the hat contract for Indy IV...they've removed all reminders of the connection with the franchise from their store show room.

Just tossing that out there....

Regards! Michaelson

Or maybe they had to take it down because they DO have the contract, and aren't supposed to draw attention to themselves.

disclaimer- I'm a firm believer(hoper) that there is NOT an Indy IV, so this is just pure pie in the sky anyway )

TR

Yep, like I said, just speculating here...

Regards! Michaelson

....or maybe Fedora managed to wipe 'em out entirely from the indiana jones hat market. lets see....the AB is less cost, better quality and more accurate to the raiders lid than the HJ poet....hmmmmm

i think its atrocious how the retailer treated you based on how you looked on the surface. i thought that sort of thing doesn't happen anymore. i guess they are in that old mentaillity of only having the "right" people sport their products....which makes me want to hang up my HJ and wait lidless until my AB arrives.

regardless of that, it would be nice to see what trips you took your HJ on.

Michaelson wrote:First of all, good to see you in these parts again, stranger!

Second of all, to just speculate on your recent visit, one has to wonder if maybe, JUST maybe if Indy 4 contracts ARE being awarded, and HJ did NOT get the hat contract for Indy IV...they've removed all reminders of the connection with the franchise from their store show room.

Just tossing that out there....

Regards! Michaelson

I was reading some old posts, and thinking about this yesterday.

It makes a lot of sense (especially in my twisted mind); certain persons, supposedly involved with the film mysteriously self-banning themselves, and other certain persons, involved in hat making, suddenly getting very quiet about the whole thing. #

Maybe Indy IV is closer than we think. I mean, rewriting the script again?

My guess is that within the next year or so there will be some great stories being told on COW.

Yeah, I went to the James Lock hatters (fantastic place, excellent service) a few days ago to get my head measured and conformed. Since I was on St. James Street, I decided to have a look in HJ for old times sake. I had been in there about a year ago and was utterly disappointed IMO, not just with the hat, but with the attitude and service of the staff. I wrote a thread about it a while ago. Anyways, so I walk in there, t-shirt and jeans, and they, like you said, looked at me like I was going to steal something. I looked around. No picture of Ford. And no Poet. I didn't even see it. Personally, I would NEVER give my money to them, as I will be wearing an AB Deluxe soon. Nope, not after the way they treated me, not worth it to me. They do sell nice flasks though....

Cheers,

James

Has anyone living around that area tried to maybe call the HJ store and just ask them if they still offer the Poet?

It's still in their catalogue

http://www.swaineadeney.co.uk/bespoke_o ... adies_hats

I wouldn't worry too much

Some nice info there on their website about how they provided the hats for Raiders(45 altogether! )..nice to see that they've had the "PLEASURE of making dozens of Indy hats for aficionados of the films"..I thought we were a sub-species to them (first time I've been called an aficionado though).

Indiana Jimbo wrote:Yeah, I went to the James Lock hatters (fantastic place, excellent service) a few days ago to get my head measured and conformed. Since I was on St. James Street, I decided to have a look in HJ for old times sake. I had been in there about a year ago and was utterly disappointed IMO, not just with the hat, but with the attitude and service of the staff. I wrote a thread about it a while ago. Anyways, so I walk in there, t-shirt and jeans, and they, like you said, looked at me like I was going to steal something. I looked around. No picture of Ford. And no Poet. I didn't even see it. Personally, I would NEVER give my money to them, as I will be wearing an AB Deluxe soon. Nope, not after the way they treated me, not worth it to me. They do sell nice flasks though....

Cheers,

James

Hi there,

I also went to James Lock a couple of months ago to buy a Panama and a hat brush and their service was top notch, I even got to chat to the Managing Director who was down from Manchester for the day the same as me! Having bought a nice hat but having failed to convince them to pack up and move to the civilized North, I went into the Swaine Adeney Brigg shop to have a look at the Poet.

Like the other guys who've posted here, I was dressed casually in jeans, a polo t-shirt etc. and I've got to say I found the service to be great. They asked me if I needed any help, I asked about Poet and they showed me what they had, apologised for the lack of choice (they only had huge sizes) and went out back to double check their stock. They didn't have any in my size but told me they were waiting for more to come in and gave me the catalogue etc. with the phone number on. Then they told me about the sale they had and, once I'd recovered from the realisation that despite the 10% off all leather luggage I'd need to re-mortgage my house to buy any, I went on my way happilly knowing that the AB was already on order.

Now, I've worked in retail for over ten years, eight of that on the shop floor, so I get disapointed when people give poor service or make me feel unwelcome, but I have to say I found non of that here. I guess it's worth remembering that the Poet is far from their major product and the sad reality of modern retail is that you have to keep an eye on the customers, whether they wear jeans or Harris Tweed.

We experienced similar things during the 2004 UK summit. When we entered Swaine Adeney (in more or less full gear), the guy behing the counter grabbed the telephone receiver in almost a "I'm-calling-the-cops manner"... his female counterpart looked upon us with badly hidden contempt.
Anyway, we did our thing, marched over to the Poet shelves for some instant disappointment, browsed the store for a while and finally, to the staff's relief, marched out through the door.

The J. Lock experience was a far better one. At first, the livery-clad doorman glanced at us with a hint of disbelief/suspicion, but did let us in. The staff was very friendly and helpful - I was even let into the back of the store, where all the centuries-old hattery tools were kept. I was also allowed to take photos of the workshop, while a very nice staff member entertained the other gearheads with history and trivia of thew Lock hattery.

Almost made one wish that they would've the creators of the screen-used hats...

erri_wan wrote:It's still in their catalogue

http://www.swaineadeney.co.uk/bespoke_o ... adies_hats

Interesting it's ladies hats. There was a Old HJ "Ladies hat" listed on ebay a while back that looked very much like a Indy Poet except the brim had been trimmed way to much or I would have bought it.

IndyDoc wrote:

erri_wan wrote:It's still in their catalogue

http://www.swaineadeney.co.uk/bespoke_o ... adies_hats

Interesting it's ladies hats. There was a Old HJ "Ladies hat" listed on ebay a while back that looked very much like a Indy Poet except the brim had been trimmed way to much or I would have bought it.

Do you still have the link?

erri_wan wrote:Do you still have the link?

No, it's been too long.