It’s all Creek to me

SANDPOINT, Idaho — A floral-print dress hangs in Susan Ritchie’s cubicle.

It’s short. It’s pink. It’s got a V-neck.

But anybody could see that.

Ritchie gets paid to tell you what you don’t see; to tell you why you need this dress; why you have to have this dress.

She and her colleagues in Sandpoint write the copy for the Coldwater Creek catalog. And if you think that just means typing “wool-blend sweater: $49.95” over and over, you clearly haven’t read their work.

So, in their world, the floral dress is not just short and pink.

“It’s potpourri in a cut-glass bowl,” says Ritchie, 59, a petite woman in a black suit with a pink scarf tied just-so at the neck (“perfect for the office or drinks after work, with a flirty feminine flair,” she might write).

Coldwater Creek got its start as a catalog-based business in 1984. Back then, the retailer sent out an 18-page book to about 2,000 customers. Now, the mailing list stands at 14 million and the company produces some 60 catalogs with about 3,000 new products each year.

The retailer is making a big push into the bricks-and-mortar sector, opening 48 new stores this year with 60 more planned for 2005. A year ago, purchases from the catalog and Internet accounted for two-thirds of Coldwater Creek’s net sales, according to company spokesman Dave Gunter. But things have changed. In the most-recent quarter, those two channels accounted for just under half of all business, Gunter says.

Still, the catalog remains a major part of Coldwater Creek’s game plan.

And that means somebody’s got to write about all of those knit tops and comfort-fit pants and tunic-length sweaters “offering endless snuggles.”

Normally, a staff of six full-time copywriters churns out the blurbs — each writing about 500 to 600 blocks a year — with the help of some freelancers when things get especially hectic. And there are many, many more who take the photos, lay out the pages, proof the copy and do all of the other jobs associated with publishing so many catalogs.

Right now, though, a national search is on to fill two copywriting spots. So, Ritchie and the others are particularly harried.

Mock-ups of catalog pages paper the walls of writers’ cubicles at Coldwater Creek’s sprawling corporate headquarters a few miles from town. Dresses and shirts fall from hangers on racks and dangle off of cabinet knobs. Writers alternately stare at computer screens, jot notes on legal pads and finger garments in search of inspiration.

The staff puts out a couple of different catalogs. There’s Northcountry, which features women’s apparel, jewelry, accessories and gift items. And there’s Spirit, which lists dressier, slightly more expensive clothing and accessories.

The blurbs in Spirit are kept to about one sentence and are more product-focused than the writerly prose that peppers Northcountry.

A typical Spirit entry: “Sparkle even without champagne, in your holiday sweater of black-beaded silk and cotton.

Short and to-the-point.

Here’s a sample from Northcountry:

“From beginning to wee hours’ end, the evening belongs to you. In a velvet dress whose ultimate grace comes from your own. As one long curve — full length, the better to glide across a ballroom — it follows every nuance of your curves to just shy of the knee. At which point, sheer godet insets create a flaring ripple of a skirt that swirls virtually without effort: turning to accept a compliment, leaning in a little closer to whisper (or be whispered to). Beads and sequins bejewel the neckline, veed seductively in back.”

Chuck McCalla, a slight 51-year-old in a plaid Oxford and tan pants who, it should be noted, has never worn a dress, penned that gem.

It doesn’t matter that he’s a man. McCalla uses his imagination to figure out why a woman might need the dress, bracelet or silk shirt he’s writing about.

Sometimes, as in the case of the formal velvet dress, need is not the issue.

“You sort of have to tap into her emotions,” McCalla says. “This is not a staple in her life … But it sure is something she’s going to want if I’ve written it right.”

And all the while, the copywriters keep an image of that mythic “She” foremost in their minds. She’s what it’s all about, after all.

So, just who is “She?”

“She’s probably between 35 and 55,” Ritchie says. “She probably works. She likes to shop. She likes fashion. She’s very busy. She probably has some kids. She’s generally friendly and cheerful.”

Says McCalla: “She likes feminine things. Unisex doesn’t sell well.”

“We think She’s got an imagination,” Ritchie adds. “She likes to imagine herself walking on the beach even though She may live in Kansas.”

The tone must remain “warm and approachable,” says Jeri Wentz, who oversees all of the copy that makes it into the catalogs.

“It’s like a good friend talking to another good friend,” Wentz says.

That’s tougher than it looks.

Imagine thumbing through your closet and having to write a short story about each blouse, skirt and shoe in it. You’re on a tight deadline. And, oh yeah, you’ve got to make other people want to buy the stuff.

It can’t be too cutesy or clever or too saccharine-sweet.

“It is very hard,” she says. “It’s particularly hard on a production schedule.”

Cross the line and you wind up a parody, like the Baroque listings from the J. Peterman catalog that got laughs on “Seinfeld” in the late ‘90s.

“Part of it’s the voice,” McCalla says. “If your set-ups sound a little sassy, or if it seems tossed away or too self-consciously clever … That’s an alienator.”

Sometimes, the writers must craft a glowing description of an item that’s at best not their style and, at worst, just plain ugly.

“There’s always something in it you think someone will like,” Ritchie says. “I may not have a kitchen with blue and white geese in it, but I can imagine somebody does.”

Despite all of the hard work that goes into the catalog, the staff says they would never think of switching to simple descriptions of fabric, sizes and prices.

“It’s our brand identity,” Ritchie says.

Plus, too many women call and write to say how much they love curling up with the catalog and a cup of tea.

Ritchie was still polishing her blurb about that floral-print dress the following day. She decided to ditch the image of the cut-glass bowl in favor of something “warmer.”

The end result:

“Recalling a shower of rose petals freed from the pages of a diary, the prettiest dress of the season beguiles in a crinkled potpourri of florals. The gossamer creation, underlit by a lining of hot pink, is gathered softly, surplice-fashion, into a veed neckline and spills smoothly below an empire waist.”

Looks easy, no?