{"id":2084,"date":"2013-06-01T13:14:13","date_gmt":"2013-06-01T10:14:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.keikari.com\/english\/?p=2084"},"modified":"2013-06-01T13:14:13","modified_gmt":"2013-06-01T10:14:13","slug":"interview-with-andy-gilchrist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.keikari.com\/english\/interview-with-andy-gilchrist\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Andy Gilchrist"},"content":{"rendered":"

‘Wisdom really does come with age and you have to be wise to know all the rules, history and nuances of men\u2019s fashion. My occupation was Occupational Safety and Fire Protection Engineer. But I always had my work done my Wednesday noon so I could go out shopping! I received two BA degrees from Kansas State University \u2013 one on sociology and the other in journalism. Plus a Certificate in Fire Protection Engineering. I have a great wife, who I met at Kansas State University and is very supportive of everything I do. Parents have both passed away, but I hope my father (see later answers) would have been proud of me. My father was in oil exploration in the Midwest USA and Canada and dressed in work khakis, but always dressed up for dinner and church. He was very interested in fashion and we took Esquire magazine, when it was a bit risqu\u00e9, just for the men\u2019s fashion.<\/p>\n

\"Interview_with_Andy_Gilchrist_at_Keikari_dot_com\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[My knowledge comes] from my father, from magazines and some books.I\u2019m very conservative and try to follow the \u201crules\u201d! I have many advertisers on AskAndyAboutClothes.com that have made me clothing but if I were to pick some it would be MyTailor.com, Caruso, Hiras Tailor, itailor.com, LS Men\u2019s Clothing, Custom Men, Imparali. I started writing my book, The Encyclopedia of Men\u2019s Clothes. One of my longtime friends, Bob McConnell, (a tennis and golf buddy) worked for IBM, and I approached him about doing a website.\u00a0 Bob said, \u201cSure, it\u2019s easy!\u201d And we went out and bought some Front Page software. The next few weeks were a real learning experience for a non-tech person (me!). But Bob worked with me and got me through setting up some pages. On either August 22, 2001 or November 2, 2001 (can\u2019t quite pin it down!) we were \u201con the air\u201d and it looked great. I kept adding to the site, and a week later I had received a total of 14 hits!\u00a0 Most of those were me looking at the site.<\/p>\n

For some reason (maybe a real need for this kind of information), in a few weeks we started getting noticed. In a couple of months Google had found us. I completed The Encyclopedia of Men\u2019s Clothes, had it reproduced on a CD-Rom and sold the first one on March 27, 2002. Then I talked Bob into putting up a Forum.\u00a0 He was a little hesitant. I\u2019m not sure he was too enthused, and it was a lot of technical work. Plus I don\u2019t think that he saw any value in a site on men\u2019s fashions. The Forum went up on or before August 24th, 2002,\u00a0 and the hits started increasing. The big break came with a story about the site and Forum in The New York Times, September 29, 2004, and the hits shot up to 160,000. They dropped a few days later, but leveled off and then began to climb to 250,000 hits a day! The May 2006 issue of Playboy Magazine recommended this site and most recently we\u2019re getting over 1,300,000 hits a day. Currently the site is averaging over 646,239 unique visitors, and 1,803,388 page views a month, and the Forum registered membership is over 65,000! And it\u2019s growing! We\u2019ve revised the site and are constantly upgrading the server to handle all the new traffic!<\/p>\n

Our next AskAndy Event is in London, Sept. 26 and it will be followed by some in Europe including several in Spain. I\u2019ve had the opportunity to write an article for Esquire Magazine and to appear on the Wealth TV Program \u201cWhat to Wear\u201d, plus I\u2019m constantly quoted in all the major media outlets (including yours!) And I was privileged to write part of the JC Penney men\u2019s sales associate training manual. Look for a collaboration project with Playboy Magazine soon, but I told them I must keep my clothes on! I\u2019m unique in that the website offers lots of free articles full of advice including the Forum. My book, The Encyclopedia Of Men\u2019s Clothes, is all advice it\u2019s not trying to sell a specific brand of clothes like most sites. [I’m inspired by] just being alive and open to all the wonderful opportunities there are out there. I don\u2019t really believe in planning, but just being open and letting fantastic things come into my life. Style is creating your own personal image within the boundaries and rules that apply to men\u2019s clothes and considering the appropriateness in respect to your fellow humans and institutions.<\/p>\n

I play golf, love to travel, have been on many wine tasting tours, enjoy exploring single malt Scotch, Classic movies and any old British TV series that happens to be on, and dining in some of the greatest restaurants in the world has been a privilege. I fear that we\u2019re loosing the battle of dressing appropriately out of respect for each other and our institutions, but I hope that AskAndyAboutClothes.com will be a beacon of knowledge and inspiration for those who don\u2019t know the rules and realize that their image is very important in success in life. Just buy a copy of the downloadable PDF, The Encyclopedia of Men\u2019s Clothes (it\u2019s less that you spent for lunch today) and you\u2019ll have more knowledge which you can instantly reference, than anyone!’<\/p>\n

http:\/\/askandyaboutclothes.com\/<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Picture:\u00a0\u00a9<\/small><\/small> MRKet<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘Wisdom really does come with age and you have to be wise to know all the rules, history and nuances …
keep reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[65,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aaac","category-interviews"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t