Leadville's Melanzana thriving with locally made clothing

By Jason Blevins The Denver Post

Self-deprecating tone aside, Howard has forged a rarity in the U.S.: a thriving textile company with no connection to China.

Melanzana hires locals and trains on the job. It's the same way Howard learned.

While his mother taught him to sew during his youth in New England, the 43-year-old basically developed his business plan and his designs as he went. But he was driven by the goal to buy only top-shelf, domestic material and keep all labor under his roof.

"We were local before local was a trend," Howard says. "You are seeing the trend of coming back from China. It's hard to communicate over there, it's a lot of travel and the quality is inconsistent. If you are using Asian-made fabrics, the environmental controls over there are so poor. If you are outdoorsy, you should be a little bit green, and doing business in China and buying Asian materials is not green."

Every year, Melanzana grows — but only in manageable leaps and never with debt. The two austere products from one fabric that he offered 18 years ago have grown to more than 30 still-simple pieces of clothing made from six Polartec fabrics. His one sewing machine — capable of making Melanzana's trademark Charlie Brown zigzag stitch — has grown to 10 machines that assemble as many as 25,000 hoodies, jackets and base layers every year. Computers assist design now, and soon Howard hopes to buy a computer-driven cutter to replace the laborious hand-cutting behind each garment.

While the only place to buy Melanzana is on his website or in Leadville, he declined to expand his store when the adjacent deli in his building shuttered. Instead, he leased the space to a new restaurant.

"A lot of this, for me, is about providing good jobs and feeding the local economy," he said.

Leadvilleites take a lot of pride in Melanzana. The company's fleeces are ubiquitous around town.

"He's a perfect model for Leadville. Strong, down-home businesses are what we need, and Melanzana is a perfect fit, manufacturing a product that is Leadville-tested," said Mayor Jaime Stuever, looking out his office window at the Melanzana shop across the town's main street, Harrison. "Everyone here loves his stuff.

"And what he's done with his shop has been a good steppingstone for other businesses. Lots of people are now fixing up their downtown businesses and repainting. He's an inspiration to our downtown district."

Jason Blevins: 303-954-1374, jblevins@denverpost.com or twitter.com/jasontblevins