Already, the world price of wool has tripled and could go higher. Nearly three-quarters of all wool is used in the production of men's suits.
Manufacturers of those suits are reluctant to pass the costs increase along to consumers, who are already turning away from suit-and-tie styles in favour of casual work wear.
Instead, manufacturers have told their tailors their wages will be cut by 35 per cent. This is supposed to be temporary, but the front-line people don't believe it.
Their union has announced a work-to-rule campaign. Members will still produce suits, but every item coming off the line will mbe two-tone. For instance, one leg of the suit trousers might be black, the other one grey. With the vest, one half will be black, the other grey.
"We hate to inconvenience the public," says Harrison Tweed, spokesman for the Amalgamated Union of Tailors and Tophatters, "but we see no other way to make the industry understand these cuts to our pay are unfair."
This means the men's fashion landscape is fast headed for a huge upheaval. Some footwear manufacturers, including Florsheim and Rockport, have already said they'll respond with two-tone footwear – that is, they will make men's dress shoes available with the right shoe in parade-square-black, the left shoe in gunboat grey.
All of this comes as a bad news to Hamolton's Werner Anders.
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In German, Anders means "different." As Anders puts it, "my name is different every day." He tries hard to live up to that name and preaches the joys of standing out in a crowd.
"If everybody was just a little different," he says, "it would be a more peaceful world."
When Werner strolls through a mall, people stare. He likes that.
They look at him because he is already wearing the look that the world will soon have to get used to.
Werner is already The Two-Tone Man. He does not relish the thought that soon men everywhere look just like him.
Werner Anders came to Canada from East Germany in 1966. He is married, with two grown children. He is 5-foot-2, 62 years old.
He is a machinist at Fruitland Tool & Manufacturing.Around there they call him Mr. Excellent, because whenever someone asks how he's doing, they always get the same tnthusiastic answer.
Werner crossed over about two years ago. His son was getting married. Werner got some new clothes, including a pair of dress boots at the Niagara Shoe Factory. If you bought one pair, you got a second pair for half price.
So Werner chose a black pair and a grey pair, size eight.
"You know," he said to the salesman and to his adoring wife, "one day I might wear one of each."
They laughed.
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Not long after, Werner went to Stoney Creek Custom Tailors and asked them to make a suit like none before – half black, half grey. The tailors balked, but Werner assured them he knew what he was doing.
He has worn his outfit to Christmas functions, dinner parties, the malls. People ask him questions and some tell him that maybe he is starting a trend.
"I don't think of myself as bein a trendsetter," he says.
"I'm just a regular guy who dared to be different."
Now, however, due to weather changes half a wolrd away, Wernder sees his individuality slipping away.
He hopes the tailors come to a quick agreement with their empolyers.
But spokesman Tweed, of the tailors union, says that's unlikely.
"The job action begins today, April 1," he says. "Our members are really worked up. We'll stick with the two-tone campaign for as long as it takes. Management will soon see we're nobody's fools."
StreetBeat appears Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday.
pwilson@thespec.com or 905-526-3391
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