Back on the Factory Floor: Jay Adoni and the Brooklyn Shoe Factory at the Heart of His Career
Nearly fifty years after his first job as a shipping clerk in a shoe factory, the founder of LJ Simone and PLV Studio works in his own factory in Brooklyn.
BROOKLYN, N.Y. Plenty of executives leave the factory behind as their careers grow. Jay Adoni, born Jacob Adoni, went the other way. Today he works in his shoe factory in Brooklyn and runs a rare coin business.
The shoe trade was his first industry in America. Soon after arriving from Israel in 1976 he worked as a shipping clerk in a shoe factory, and by 1978 he had founded LJ Simone.
The decades in between gave him a view of the business from every level: building a brand of his own, running Pentland USA after its 1993 purchase of LJ Simone, and creating the Pour La Victoire and Kelsi Dagger labels at PLV Studio.
The Brooklyn factory is a family story as much as a business one. He built the original Brooklyn factory, his sons later relaunched the brand as Modern Vice, and he works there and consults for it. Modern Vice is known for shoes made in New York City. In a 2013 profile of the family business, Inc. magazine described him as "a fashion industry elder statesman who once employed Steve Madden as a salesman and more recently launched the successful shoe brand Pour La Victoire", and reported that he was then CEO of The Adoni Group, with his son Jensen as president.
Next to the factory work he keeps a second, quieter venture: a rare coin business.
Photographs and the full footwear chapter are on the official site of Jay Adoni.
Media contact: jayadoni.com/contact.html
About Jay Adoni
Jay Adoni, born Jacob Adoni, is a New York footwear entrepreneur. He founded LJ Simone and PLV Studio, served as President of Pentland USA and works in his shoe factory in Brooklyn. Website: jayadoni.com.