All about Skin (43 page)

Derma
had it all wrong. Their feeble attempt to launch
heritage hides
was laughable. Imagine thinking Mr. Ed singing “got to know about history” would make any impact? I think it was voted the worst commercial of 1988. Price was another factor. Some say they priced themselves out of their own marketplace.

Derma
refused to entertain the idea of growth even though revenues were down 30 percent and profits almost nonexistent. In the meantime,
All Nippon Cutis
merged with the largest hairbank in Frankfurt, while
Epiderm
was borrowing heavily both in London and New York to finance their expansion. The
Wall Street Journal
suggested that
Epiderm
's reliance on junk bonds would be their undoing, but you couldn't be too critical of junk in those days. Even
Integume
dived right in, expanding and grabbing share in markets like Moscow, Shanghai, and Prague, as well as in places like Cincinnati, Seattle, and Minneapolis, where
cosmopol
became more popular than
american
. By now,
Derma
was a distant number four behind those three global leaders, at least in sales and profits. If you count market size,
People's PiFu
is right up there, but of course, prices aren't comparable, given their rock-bottom manufacturing costs.

In the end, everything turned on principle, plus a little Chinese intrigue.

You've heard the conspiracy theories, about how the CIA negotiated with
Soong & Dong
to flood the global market with synthetic epidermatis. There are even whispers that it had to do with WTO membership for the motherland. I don't believe those rumors myself, but you must admit the sudden availability of top-quality synthetic raw material, at a third of the prevailing price per kilo, was unprecedented. Ever since the worldwide skin crisis of the seventies, the industry's been wary of shortages. Survival has depended on reducing costs, which meant going synthetic.

Price wars raged. Folks started buying five, ten, even as many as twenty topskins, never mind the multiples in underskins. Even my parents each bought a second, although Ma complained that synthetic just didn't feel as good. Suddenly, skin took on a whole new dimension. The markets for other body parts went into shock, unable to compete against this surge in demand for skin and only skin. Meanwhile, futures in natural epidermatis were priced 25 percent up even in the nearest months, which battered
Derma
. Rumor had it they were buying supplies from
People's PiFu
, who of course didn't suffer an iota, given their government-regulated market.

And then, in the middle of 1997, the worldwide skin market crashed.

It was bound to happen. Folks were carrying debt over their heads in skins. Even with cheaper prices, an average one still comprises a hefty percentage of most incomes. Besides, as Papa declared, how many skins can a person wear anyway? Used, recycled, and even slightly defective new skins flooded the stores. Now, everyone's fancy skins were worth less than a mound of toenails.

Things looked bleak.

Folks are funny. They self correct pretty quickly in the face of disaster. Everyone laid low on skins for a while. Television pundits compare the past few years to the Great Eyelash Famine as well as the New Deal in Teeth. I don't pay much attention to pundits myself. They invent connections where there are none.

Derma
's comeback was quite the media circus. Among the larger companies, they had the upper hand now because they hadn't invested in growth, and consequently, weren't sitting on useless inventory or excessive debt. There's nothing quite like cash, is there? But I have to admire their new CEO for some pretty-quick moves. First, there was the hostile takeover of
Epiderm International
, instantly transforming
Derma
into the largest in the industry. That caught
Integume
and
All Nippon Cutis
completely off guard. By the time they proposed buying
SubCutis
, that company's parent,
All Nippon Cutis
, was too broke not to capitulate.

Ultimately, however, it was brilliant marketing that invigorated them. “Why pretend? Slide into a genuine
american
. One is all you'll ever need.” Sales picked up, thanks to their clever offer of low-interest, long-term loans. If you bought a top-of-the-line skin, they threw in an
Epiderm
topskin or
SubCutis
accessory on layaway at a discount. They didn't have to lower prices or redesign their main line. Timing was all. Folks were sick to death of hype.

Well, I wasn't going to be left behind over something as important as skin. Skin buying is something you do once in a purple sun, or at least, that's the way it used to be in my father's day, as he loves to remind me.
Derma
refinanced my debt with
SubCutis
and
Epiderm
. It made my millennium celebration.

I'd like to stay with
american
for a while. You know, give myself time to get used to it. It fits well, neither too tight nor too loose. I still have faith in this classic model.

But the skin industry's so unpredictable these days.

Epiderm US
launched two niche lines in time for Christmas,
indigo jazz
and
latin hues
, and sales were bigger than anyone predicted. Maybe they're not so niche. And how about that rash of IPOs of small companies in the middle of last year? Who would have thought the stock prices of
Kimchee Kasings, Hide-the-Curry
, and
TagalogitPelts
could triple by year end? Some analysts think these upstarts could give
Derma
a run for their money. Nothing's what it seems anymore.

Also,
People's PiFu
has been making noises recently about going public here, saying they'll list on the New York Stock Exchange. Now that's earth-shattering news in my books. They hired this youngish CEO a few years back—quite a change for them—and just launched a brand-new product line,
sinokapitalist
. I like it. It's got a kind of postmodern pizzaz, something I can't quite define, that seems right for this century. Papa thinks it's ridiculous, although he grudgingly admits now that
china cutis
has run its course.

Let's just say I've learned from my fashion mistakes. Besides, for all we know, the next trend will be in chins or something else equally as unexpected. I'll wait a bit, to see how this new model fares, before I even think about exchanging my
american
skin.

Aracelis González Asendorf
was born in Cuba and raised in Florida. Her short stories have appeared in
Kweli Journal, Puerto del Sol, Sunscripts
, the
Weekly Planet
, and the anthology
100% Pure Florida Fiction
. Her story “The Lost Ones” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She has been a contributor at the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference and a recipient of a New York State Summer Writers Institute scholarship. A former English and Spanish teacher, she is currently working on an MFA at the University of South Florida.

Unoma Azuah
is a Nigerian-born writer, teacher, and activist. She has earned acclaim through her novels, poetry, and research on sexuality and LGBTI issues in Nigeria. Her debut novel
Sky-high Flames
(2005) received the Urban Spectrum Award and the Association of Nigerian Authors/NDDC/Flora Nwapa Award. Her other accolades include the prestigious Hellman/Hammett grant and the Leonard Trawick Creative Writing Award. Her latest novel,
Edible Bones
(2012), won the Aidoo-Snyder Book Prize. Currently, she is a college professor in Tennessee and is working on her second collection of poems, tentatively titled “Home Is Where the Hurt Hurts.”

Jacqueline Bishop
, award-winning poet, novelist, essayist, painter, and photographer, was born in Kingston, Jamaica, and now lives in New York City. She has held several Fulbright Fellowships, and exhibited her work widely in North America, Europe, and North Africa. She is also a master teacher in liberal studies at New York University. For more information, visit
www.jacqueline-bishop.com
.

Glendaliz Camacho
was raised in the Washington Heights neighborhood of New York City. She studied at Fordham University and labored in several editorial departments in publishing. Her writing has appeared in
Southern Pacific Review, Infective Ink
, and the
Acentos Review
, among others. She is a 2013 Pushcart Prize nominee. She is currently at work on a short-story collection.

Learkana Chong
is a fangirl, critic, and writer interested in the subversion of mainstream narratives and the self-articulation of her own truths (which often run counter to mainstream narratives). She received her BA in English– creative writing at Mills College in 2013 and is still debating whether or not to go the MFA route. She currently resides in Oakland and is working on a screenplay.

Jennine Capó Crucet
is the author of the novel
Magic City Relic
(2015) and the story collection
How to Leave Hialeah
(2009), which won the Iowa Short Fiction Award, the John Gardner Prize, and the Devil's Kitchen Award in Prose. The collection was also named a Best Book of the Year by the
Miami Herald
, the
Miami New Times
, and the Latinidad List. A winner of an O. Henry Prize and a Bread Loaf Fellow, she served as the 2013/14 Picador Guest Professor of American Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Leipzig in Germany. After several years working in South Central Los Angeles as a counselor to first-generation college students, she currently lives and teaches in Florida.

Ramola D
's
Temporary Lives
(2009) was awarded the AWP's 2008 Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction and was a finalist for the 2010 Library of Virginia Fiction Literary Award.
Invisible Season
(1998), her first poetry collection, co-won the Washington Writers' Publishing House award. Her second collection,
Against the Conspiracy of Things
, was a finalist in the 2013 Benjamin Saltman Prize from Red Hen Press. Her work has appeared in various journals, including
Quiddity International, Kartika Review, Kweli Quarterly, Urban Confustions, Los Angeles Review, Short Review, Blackbird, Prairie Schooner, Agni, Literal Latte, Beltway Quarterly, Green Mountains Review, Indiana Review, Writer's Chronicle
, and
Indian Express
, and has been reprinted in
Best American Poetry 1994, Best American Fantasy 2007, Full Moon on K Street: Poems about Washington, DC
, and
Literal Latte
's
The Anthology: Highlights from Fifteen Years of a Unique “Mind Stimulating” Literary Magazine
. Her fiction was shortlisted under 100 Other Distinguished Stories in
Best American Stories 2007
and included in
Enhanced Gravity: More Fiction by Washington Area Women
. A Discovery/
The Nation
finalist and five-time Pushcart Prize nominee, she is the recipient of a 2005 National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in poetry. She holds an MFA from George Mason University and a BS in physics and an MBA from the University of Madras. She has most recently taught creative writing at George Washington University and at the Writer's Center, Bethesda. She is the founder and coeditor of
Delphi Quarterly
, an online journal for writer, poet, and filmmaker interviews. She currently lives in the Boston area with her husband and daughter, and runs art and creative writing workshops for children while working on fiction and poetry.

Patricia Engel
is the author of
It's Not Love, It's Just Paris
(2013) and
Vida
(2010), which was a
New York Times
Notable Book of the Year, a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Foundation Award and the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, and a Best Book of the Year chosen by NPR, Barnes & Noble,
Latina
, and
LA Weekly
. She was a 2014 National Endowment for the Arts fellow in fiction, and her award-winning fiction has appeared in the
Atlantic, A Public Space, Boston Review, Harvard Review, Guernica
, and numerous other publications. Born to Colombian parents and raised in New Jersey, Patricia now lives in Miami.

Amina Gautier
is the author of the short-story collections
At-Risk
(
2011
), which won the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction, and
Now We Will Be Happy
(2014), which won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Fiction. Her stories have been honored with the Crazyhorse Fiction Prize, the Danahy Prize, the Jack Dyer Prize, the Lamar York Prize, the Schlafly Microfiction Award, and the William Richey Award as well as fellowships from the American Antiquarian Society, the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the Prairie Center of the Arts, the Sewanee Writers' Conference, and the Ucross Foundation, and artist grants from the Illinois Arts Council and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

Manjula Menon
's stories have appeared in
Nimrod, North American Review, Santa Monica Review, Pleiades, Southern Humanities Review, Tampa Review
, and
Ego Magazine
, among others. She was awarded residencies at Yaddo and the Vermont Studio Center and has been a waiter at the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference.

Chinelo Okparanta
was born in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. She is the author of
Happiness, Like Water
, a 2013
New York Times Sunday Book Review
Editors' Choice, and one of the
Guardian
's Best African Fiction of 2013. A 2014 NYPL Young Lions Award Finalist, and a Rolex Mentors and Protégés Finalist in Literature, Okparanta has been nominated for a United States Artists Fellowship in Literature, long-listed for the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award, and short-listed for the Caine Prize for African Writing.

Jina Ortiz
holds an MFA in creative writing/poetry from the Solstice Creative Writing Program at Pine Manor College in Chestnut Hill, Massa-chusetts. She is an adjunct professor of English at Quinsigamond Community College. Her writings have been published in the
Afro-Hispanic Review, Cala
bash, Green Mountains Review, Worcester Review
, the
Caribbean Writer
, and
Solstice Literary Magazine
, among others. She has received residency fellowships from Art Omi at Ledig House, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (VCCA), the Vermont Studio Center, Can Serrat in Barcelona, Spain, and others. She also received grants from the Worcester Cultural Commission and the Highlights Foundation.