Ping Buccawhosit

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http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/n...ne/6443954.htm

its all you baby

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For those who love mullets - just not permanently
The mullet wig, a streaming-down-the-back bundle of hair and nostalgia, is making a bundle for a N.J. entrepreneur. By John Shiffman



Plenty of guys go to Vegas, get drunk, and get grand ideas for making money.

Then there is Frank J. Koller.

A parole officer at Riverfront State Prison in Camden, Koller has weaved his latest business idea into a cash cow, stunning friends and family who figured it was just another one of his hair-brained schemes.

From his Web site, mulletwigs.com, Koller and his partners sell, well, mullet wigs - a gag gift mocking the hairstyle also known as "hockey hair," "hi-lo," or "business in the front, party in the back."

Think Andre Agassi, pre-Steffi. Joey Buttafuoco. The '93 Phillies.

"It's stupid. It's crazy. People are buying them," Koller said.

Since November, the fledgling business based in Koller's home in Hamilton Township, Mercer County, has sold about 1,500 wigs, priced at $19.99 a pop. Anticipating brisk fall sales, especially for Halloween, Koller's crew has ordered thousands more from a Hong Kong supplier. He's also pitching the wigs to local sports teams as a giveaway.

The company sells four models: the Landscaper (also known as "the Ape Drape"), the Trash ("Kentucky Waterfall"), the Class of 1987 ("the Nebraska Neck Warmer"), and the Female Mullet ("the Bingo").

"We've taken less of a profit in order to make the highest-quality wig - 100 percent synthetic Chinese hair," Koller said.

But it's not too small a profit margin, mind you. "It's healthy, let's leave it at that," he said.

Koller and his partners, cousin Alicia Koller and childhood friend Bill Nabinger, conceived the idea after downing a few vodka cocktails at a Las Vegas comedy club last summer.

"We kept spotting guys with mullets and thought, 'Why not?' " Frank Koller said.

When they returned to South Jersey, Alicia Koller drew up designs, Frank Koller researched manufacturers, and Nabinger found a Web designer. They began with e-mails to friends and bought advertisements on established mullet Web sites.

Orders cascaded in. They came from radio shock jocks, U.S. troops in Iraq, and others across the country, even an Ohio police officer planning undercover drug buys.

To be sure, all three entrepreneurs are guilty of either once having a mullet or admiring one. The guys had theirs in junior high school. "And I had a serious boyfriend who wanted to cut it off," Alicia Koller confided. "I flipped out and told him no."

Koller and his colleagues appear to be riding a rising wave of kitsch interest in the mullet, including a recent book, a documentary, and several in-depth Web sites.

The hairstyle's biggest national exposure by far is likely to come in the fall, when UPN launches the TV show The Mullets on Tuesday nights. The sitcom stars Loni Anderson as the doting mother of two roofers who dig pro wrestling, Guns N' Roses, Miller Genuine Draft, and girls who smell like nachos.

Seriously.

"The mullet is so out of style that we thought it could be in style again," a UPN spokeswoman said. "We like to call it the smartest stupid show on television."

It is safe to say that this does not impress style gurus. People such as Damien Von Dahlem, who edits the e-zine Hair Online, sniff that a mullet is a hideous hair crime.

"It is a product of men who want to look like they did in high school, you know, because they don't want to grow up," he said. "I'm sorry to say it's having a resurgence, like everything disco."

Not so fast, says country music publicist Holly Gleason. She monitors style in Nashville, where "Achy Breaky Heart" crooner Billy Ray Cyrus became the mullet's poster boy in the early '90s.

In Music City, at least, the mullet is dead.

"Billy Ray made an outdated 'do really hip," Gleason said. "But somewhere along the line, somebody caught on, and in that classic case of 'Uh-oh, the emperor is naked,' everybody started shearing them off. Billy Ray's was the first to go, Troy Gentry followed, and in this land of good Republican guitar slingers and cowboy singers, there's scarcely a hi-lo to be found."

For his part, Cyrus declined to be interviewed for this article. His agent says discussing mullets "makes him uncomfortable."

Koller, who drives a leased black Mercedes-Benz to his day job at the prison, can't explain his success. "That's the million-dollar question," said Koller, who favors a gel-slicked look for his own locks.

His mother, Michelle Koller, describes her son as a natural-born salesman. She recalls the time his sixth-grade teacher called and said: "Mrs. Koller, did you know your son is renting out his Nintendos to other kids in class?"

Mom didn't miss a beat. She told the teacher: "Yeah, and it's one of the smartest things he's ever done. I mean, he's not paying attention in class, so why not earn a buck?"

But there are other schemes that Mom remembers not quite so fondly. One was Koller's plan to create a game in which contestants try to fling a quarter into a miniature basketball hoop. The games were contained in small glass boxes, which Koller hoped to place in barbershops and restaurants. Contestants who scored - it was next to impossible - would win a free haircut or dinner.

Unfortunately for Koller, the state Division of Gaming Enforcement frowned on the idea.

"So now we have all these machines with ball-hoops in the house, and we're trying to figure out what... to do with them," his mother said.

Michelle Koller takes no credit for her son's success with the mullet: "He certainly hasn't gotten any encouragement from me."

But, busting her son's chops a bit more, she added: "Of course, I'll be the first one to ride his coattails to help him cash a big check."

This does not mean she doesn't worry about him. After all, he's 26 and remains a very eligible bachelor.

"He tells me, 'Mom, if my W-2 has enough zeroes, there'll be a girl somewhere.' "