Who Is Paul Frank?
Such is the price of über-fame kids: Paul Frank is suing Paul Frank Industries. Here’s a snip from the Vanity Fair article:
Since its inception in 1995, Paul Frank Industries has sold $100 million worth of its cute but edgy clothes and accessories, and won the loyalty of trendsetters from Jack White to Maddox Jolie. Late last year, however, it lost the allegiance of Paul Frank himself, the design savant whose quirky creations, starting with Julius the monkey, gave birth to the brand itself. As Frank and his erstwhile partners trade allegations of disrespect, disengagement, and wedding-day slights in a battle for millions of dollars, the question arises: Which Paul Frank—the man or the company—is to blame?
Read the full article here (Grab a coffee and settle in, it be looonngg).
[via Boing Boing]
Long and depressing article but thank you for posting. What a mess… it paints Paul Frank (the man) so poorly. Since I’m more of an artist than a ’suit’ (as the article puts the 2 sides just so plainly) I feel for the guy. Who wouldn’t want a little breathing room after being trapped in a commercial machine for years. The grass always looks greener, right? But it all sounds so catty and juvenile.
So one moral of the story is: Always read your contracts before signing.
Wow, that was depressing and makes me wonder if I could handle success.
That article was being discussed at gigposters.com last night. It’s one sad situation. Here’s one lesson outta that: don’t give your company your name.
Messymessymessy.
Wow! That is quite a mess indeed. At first I found myself rooting for Paul, and then ambivalence set in. It sounds like all parties involved have some blame and they will not own up to it. It makes me sad since Paul Frank Industries has been one of my favourite brands/clothing lines. I don’t quite know what to think.
Paul Frank is dead, long live Paul Frank!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/deadzebra/238409556/
Imagine a bunch of people wearing shirts that says “we are…’your name’”, as this aggressive way of claiming ownership of a whole line of stuff that has it’s foundation in your designs. I don’t care how many products the company designed independant of Paul–the root of it seems to be derived from Paul Frank’s template. It’s sort of like Hello Kitty. The initial designs are where the entire rest of the product line comes from, and without those designs, you have no company.
It also sounds like they were really pressuring him to go out and promote this stuff, when that ammount of glad handling just doesn’t fit well with the guys personality. That ammount of social contact for a guy who seems pretty sensitive to human contact in general was probably not so healthy for him, and likely made its mark. If he became less involved in the product line and less involved in the company in general I really think this is the root cause. The ammount to which he was willing to do all that promotion is actually a credit to how amenable he was willing to be, in spite of his own comfort level and happiness.
Sure, it sounds like Paul Frank’s social skills suck. And the Employees at Paul Frank enterprises probably didn’t get along with him well, because Paul Frank has a hard time getting along with people in general, not because he’s a dick, but because some people aren’t very good at that. They probably mistook his inability to relate to people for aloofness. It sounds like they wanted him to be something he couldn’t be. What they should have done is given him the space to just do what he’s best at doing.
I think the owner sounded truly vicious when he compared Frank’s leaving the company to a prima donna sit-com child star leaving a popular sit-com, as if Frank was just an accessory to the company’s success, rather than the foundation for it’s success. I really have a hard time sympathizing. They failed to cultivate, squandered, and ultimately lost the companies key asset, and I hope Frank works for somebody else who values him more, makes a new line of designs, and kicks their butts.
i thought paul frank was supposed to be your friend?
no matter what actually went down, it’s sad to see such a great story end like that. here’s hoping everybody gets what they deserve out of it, and paul frank gets to keep doing what he does best.
Unbelievably sad. Sounds like a case of misunderstandings of gargantuan proportaions, a gigantic lack of communiation, and no sorely needed ‘bridge’ or ‘buffer’ people in their professional lanscape at all. The bully mentality described at PFI (judging by the We Are Paul Frank t-shirts) ounds sadly as if it’s fostering morale there. I’m not taking sides, I only read one article and I can see how there could be blame on both sides. It’s terribly sad. I hope that Paul Frank – the man, not the Industry, treats us all to an awesome comeback story in a few years’ time.
“a gigantic lack of communiation…”
I couldn’t agree more, Kathy.
What a sad story. This is a falling-out that should never have happened.
I am not even a fan of Paul Frank, however, I do feel for the guy. However, as an introverted person myself, I believe there is absolutely no excuse for poor social skills. You have to learn to relate to other people on some level whether you like it or not. And how in the world could the guy have signed away his stuff without reading the contracts?
I don’t really know about any of the folks involved, but I actually found myself leaning toward the side of the folks at PFI–although I don’t agree with the corporate underhandedness described in the article.
I agree with Kathy. I think blame lies with both sides. And I also hope to see a Paul Frank comeback.
It doesn’t sound like it was just poor social skills – he described some really powerful anxiety, and that he didn’t want to take medication for it (suggesting someone had presented him that option). Paul Frank seems extremely sensitive, to the point where it prevented him getting along in the business world.
From PFI’s perspective it WAS Paul’s fault, because they just 100% could not relate to his problems, and he wasn’t trying to express them. He acted on his feelings. “Bridge or buffer people” to mediate the situation may indeed have helped. He felt alone.
His comeback is inevitable, isn’t it? No one can stop him from being talented!
Poor social skills isn’t an excuse for not getting along with people by any means. But you also have to consider what people are best at doing, and if you want them to perform well, you should cater to their strengths. Going around the country in a Winabago signing posters and shaking hands was not something that came easily to or was the best fit for Paul Frank, but his partners seemed pretty insistant that this be his role in the company. I don’t think it was necessary or best for the company or Frank for him to be placed in the role of promoter and spokesperson. I think, though it’s not explicitly said, this was either directly or indirectly the cause of all the other friction.
It also sounds like Frank didn’t exactly know how to say know, and he resented the fact that he couldn’t. This is not an excuse for bad behavior either, but you have to wonder what his partners were thinking, knowing the kind of person Frank is, when they were sending him allover the country to promote this stuff.
Although I’m not a fan of his work this leaves an awful feeling in my stomach.
Typical suits:
1)Find someones skills to exploit (artist,musician,factory worker)
2)Demand things that are almost unatainable.
3)And then make the person who was responsible for starting everything feel in debt to them.
Businessmen are nothing but snakes. They are here to make a profit at any cost and at others expense. When are people going to wake up and realize this.
Paul didn’t want to make appearances because he was an introvert not a prima donna.
If that old man in the boardroom had asked me what I did in the company, he would have been picking his teeth up off the floor.
The run-in with his “partner’s” father- a PF board member- was all I needed to take sides. I think a boycott is in order. As creative people, we obviously all recognize what happened here. He got screwed out of his company and his name. Don’t support this kind of behavior. In fact, DO support the real Paul in his next project. I’m sure they’ll get a bunch of awful artists to repurpose his artwork, but true fans will be able to tell the difference.
Paul Frank Inc must die.
Paul did NOT get screwed out of his company! I am so sick of all these blogs saying that Paul is a victim! Paul stopped showing up to work. Simple as that. He continued to get payed and he didn’t do anything for that paycheck. This whole fight started when Paul got married and his new wife refused to sign a prenump. Then she pushed for him to sue and have the company desolved so SHE could get more money! And thats the ugly truth. She refused to sign. Its not about a poor artist getting bullied by the man. Its about a guy who got P-whipped and tried to screw over his company.
I realize I’m a little late on this but I just read the article and all the comments and I have to say, I feel really angry and sick to my stomach. It sounds like Paul’s “partners” got caught up in their greed and ego. I know these two snakes will get what they deserve. Paul, on the other hand, needs to learn how to stand up for himself against people like that. Who knows? He’s probably better off without those two now.
I think commenter “who cares” didn’t care about reading the entire article. I’m sick of women being used as scapegoats in society. The whole “Yoko” reference was so contrived and ridiculous. In the article, it says there was no “prenump”, just a contract she signed that protected each partner’s shares of the company-which was in their agreement from the start. This means it wouldn’t affect her either way. It sounds to me like Paul wouldn’t be like his greedy, “twice-divorced” partner who believes in pre-nups and it’s hilarious they were “shocked” that they weren’t invited to the wedding after trying to meddle in it. I mean, really?
I absolutely agree with commenter Tom that true fans can tell the difference. I no longer see the clothes at department stores and now see them on sale at JC Penny’s. I hear Paul is working on a new line and I look forward to supporting him and not the two bald idiots.
LONG LIVE THE REAL PAUL FRANK!