Talk:Carhartt/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

unencyclopedic tag

the tagged section, and parts of the section immediately following, read very much like an advertisement for Carhartt, rather than an encyclopedia article about Carhartt. for example, unless you can find consumer product reports that verify that Carhartt "is known for hard-wearing, rugged, durable work clothes," that statement has to be considered biased. I don't think this requires major work, but I think a more neutral tone is called for. --Ludwigs2 (talk) 21:17, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Carhartt news items

Searching Google News archives for "Carhartt jacket" is amusing. These are all from the first page of search results.

• Two rob and rape woman, police say: Ordeal continues about two hours. He wore a black ski mask, a black Carhartt jacket, a black and white T-shirt and black jeans. The second suspect was described as a 17-year-old black male...[1]
• Hip-hop artist details killing Earlier police testimony identified the man in the Carhartt jacket as Rashawn Anderson, 20, of Topeka. Anderson is charged with premeditated first-degree ...[2]
• Bank robbers got away with $13,900 One of the men wore a brown Carhartt jacket and was carrying a camouflage backpack. The other man was wearing a blue Carhartt jacket and was carrying a ... [3]
• Michigan Court of Appeals Reports - PEOPLE v. WILLIAMS, 275 Mich.... At approximately 9:30 pm on December 17, 2004, a man wearing a tan hooded Carhartt jacket and jeans approached Patti Harris in a parking lot outside a drug ... [4]

Well, I suppose it's a market niche. --John Nagle (talk) 06:23, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Carhartt#Popularity_with_drug_dealers

is this encyclopedic? badmachine (talk) 18:22, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

We have reliable sources for that. The sourcing for that is better than the sourcing for any of the promotional material. --John Nagle (talk) 00:44, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Today, 70.227.70.3 (talk · contribs) attempted to remove that section again. A traceroute connects that IP address to "70-227-70-3.carhartt.com". --John Nagle (talk) 19:12, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

IMO, that looks like WP:UNDUE as a tiny fraction of the products they produce are worn by criminals. Yes, it can be reliably sourced, but does Nike, Inc.[5] or Reebok (manufacturer of New York Yankees baseball caps)[[6] have a section about criminals wearing their products?

On the other hand, Carhartt employees really shouldn't be editing this article. —DoRD (?) (talk) 20:24, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

It's not undue weight. Google News searches for Carhartt repeatedly bring up descriptions of criminals in the first few searches. Nike or Reebok don't seem to have that problem. It's part of Carhartt's demographic. --John Nagle (talk) 21:22, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I have moved it to within another section; having its own section definitely seems to be undue weight. I think if someone can think of a way to pare it down a little further, it would be fair to include it where it is now, in the U.S. section. --Floquenbeam (talk) 23:27, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

How many criminals have to wear it before its notable? WP:BIGNUMBER. Google news searches saying a criminal wore a particular brand of clothing and you claiming notability is tantamount to original research. There are millions of criminals all over the world, no matter how many news searches you return it is going to be a drop in the bucket and not a significant or notable percentage.--Crossmr (talk) 23:38, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Concur with Floquenbeam. It would be undue weight for this to have it's own section (if only because the reference only makes claims for US criminals). And to try and use gNews to back-up a claim that criminals tend to wear Carhartt is as Crossmr says, totally absurd (not to mention an OR/SYNTH problem). -- Bfigura ^(talk) 02:43, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

It's one of the few pieces of information about the company that comes from a reliable source. Almost everything else in the article is either from a PR source or is uncited. More citations could be found; they have a writeup in AdWeek this week about their "music branding strategy".[7] Their European operation is promoting a tough urban look, and even has a skateboarding team.[8] --John Nagle (talk) 18:13, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

And for you to string it all together is synthesis. Some criminals wear clothing + they have an urban look + music branding != their target audience is criminals. Unless you have a direct quote saying as much, you don't get to imply it. -- Bfigura ^(talk) 18:15, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually, we do have a direct quote, from the New York Times. Quoting a Carhartt sales rep, no less. --John Nagle (talk) 18:42, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

An attempt was made by Thaddt (talk · contribs) to delete this information. New account, two edits, no edits to any other article, no edit comment. Reverted. --John Nagle (talk) 08:50, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, and that supports the current sentence. The article however, does not support the claim that their target audience was criminals. Saying that Company A's piano wire is popular with murderers is not the same as saying Company A markets piano wire to murderers. That leaves us with the question of whether including the statement that 'X is popular with Y' is necessary or encyclopedic. -- Bfigura ^(talk) 17:28, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

The fact that Carhartt became popular in hip hop culture is a reasonable thing to add. The "crack dealer" theory behind this popularity isn't unreasonable, but emphasizing it too much is undue weight. I've kept the info, but condensed it and incorporated it in the paragraph. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:29, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Nice job. -- Bfigura ^(talk) 21:36, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

That's a change from a cited quote from the New York times to brochureware. That's a bit much. --John Nagle (talk) 06:34, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with re-adding the superfluous crack dealer quote, for the reasons Bfigura and I have already stated above. It's not a change from the cited quote, it's a summary of the entire article. You're chosing one sentence that was kind of a throwaway line and emphasizing that. It makes the article poorer. --Floquenbeam (talk) 12:59, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Here's the entire context, from the New York Times article:

For generations, the Carhartt jacket was "strictly utilitarian," said Jonathan Van Meter, the editor in chief of Vibe, a hip-hop magazine. "It's basically a barn jacket. I grew up around barns and horses, and Carhartt was part of my childhood."

In the late 1980's, crack dealers, who also spend a lot of time outdoors, discovered the Carhartt. "They needed to keep warm and they needed to carry a lot of stuff," said Steven J. Rapiel, the New York City salesman for Carhartt. "Then the kids saw these guys on the street, and it became the hip thing to wear."

Then, two years ago, Tommy Boy Records, a hip-hop label, decided to use the jacket, already hot on the streets, as a promotional tool, complete with embroidered company logo.

Eight hundred of the jackets were given to "taste makers and people seen in all the right places," said Monica Lynch, the president of Tommy Boy. "It took off immediately." And then Tommy Boy started its own clothing line. WHY NOW: After building a reputation literally on the backs of oil riggers and "gangsta" rappers, Carhartt jackets are increasingly turning up in places like Barneys New York and fashion runways.

So the New York Times reports crack dealer usage created the "hip thing to wear" image, which was then exploited by Tommy Boy Records in a promotional giveaway. The Wikipedia article distorts this.

We have to be a bit cautious here, because of repeated attempts by Carhartt-affiliated editors to alter the article. --John Nagle (talk) 18:53, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Carhartt tried to edit the article anonymously, yet again, to delete this.[9]. Geolocate on that IP [10] returns " UNITED STATES - MICHIGAN - DEARBORN - CARHARTT INC - CARHARTT.COM."--John Nagle (talk) 17:57, 16 November 2010 (UTC)