‘I like the profit margin on storytelling’

Chick-fil-A president admires stories

In 1951, at the age of 20, Ike Behar leaves Havana with $50 in his pocket and — it goes without saying — a dream in his heart.

He arrives in New York and offers his custom shirt-making services for free to prove his skills. A few years later, Ralph Lauren takes note of Behar’s workmanship and asks him to make shirts for his line. By 1995, Behar struck out on his own, building what today is an international company.

A form of that story appears on a hangtag on Behar’s Havana 32 shirt. And that hangtag recently got some attention from another family-owned business executive, Chick-fil-A’s president and COO Dan Cathy.

Cathy asked Alan Behar, Ike’s son, how much the company spends on the Havana 32 hangtag. The tag, it turned out, costs $1. The markup on the shirt because of the tag? $10.

“I like the profit margin on storytelling,” Cathy says. “Behar makes more on storytelling than on shirts.”