Hanky Panky launches online store

released: October 28, 2009 12:40 PM
Lingerie firm knits a better online strategy: Lida Orzeck's and Gale Epstein's Hanky Panky hopes to reinforce business with its new e-commerce site.

interview with the founders

Interesting tidbits reported about Hanky Panky:

"Founded in 1977, Manhattan-based Hanky Panky was the brainchild of longtime friends Lida Orzeck and Gale Epstein, who were inspired by a pair of handmade panties one had given the other as a gift. The duo launched Hanky Panky—with some financial help from their families—to give comfortable cotton underthings a place in the wider world of lingerie.

“At the time, it was a nylon world,” says Ms. Epstein.

Hanky Panky's big break came decades later, in June 2004, when The Wall Street Journal ran a front-page article on the company's signature lace thong."

On facebook

"The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has selected Hanky Panky’s original HANKY LINGERIE underwear and thongs for its permanent costume collection." (multiple sources)--although a search of the MOMA site does not turn up this item. Searching with google is not turning up much either, the only picture I could find of this item is on the company website.

Name Game: "In the 70’s,Hanky Panky emerged, creating intimate apparel constructed of fine embroidered cotton handkerchiefs – hence the company name." (source)

How-to make a handkerchief camisole (circa 1912)

SALES TRENDS: "Women's underwear sales, which include bras, panties and other undergarments, are expected to fall to $13.6 billion year this year from $14 billion in 2008, according to consumer research firm Mintel. Though the sector will recover eventually—sales are expected to top $14 billion again by 2012—retailers are pushing value over luxury."

RANDOM HISTORICAL NOTE:

Panty Raids at OSU

One e-mail was from a man whom Bryans said he thinks could have been a student during the panty raids of the 1950s and 1960s.
The panty raids were part of a period of time when the university had a lot of restrictions on students such as dress codes, curfews and behavioral manners.

“As people began to question the regulations, one of the things that was quite popular among campuses was for male students, usually with cooperation of female students, to raid their rooms and take a pair of panties as a sign of defiance that they were not abiding by the administration wishes,” Bryans said.

(source)