American Apparel Gets Adult Supervision

On a recent conference call with American Apparel (APP) store managers, someone asked how to fix a printer. Embattled founder and Chief Executive Officer Dov Charney, whose company lost $86 million in 2010 and disclosed last month that a cash crunch could tip it into bankruptcy, piped up that he would look into it. "He should have said 'I will have somebody else do it,' " says Martin Staff, a veteran apparel executive brought in last month as chief of business development. "That's the conversion from a small company to a large company, and I think he's still learning."

At the urging of creditors, Charney recently brought in professional managerial help. Besides Staff, a veteran manager at Ralph Lauren (RL) and Calvin Klein (PVH), former Blockbuster Chief Financial Officer Thomas Casey is acting president. The company also named John Luttrell chief financial officer, a post he previously held at Gap's (GPS) Old Navy chain. Staff says American Apparel holds promise. "I don't want to say this is low-hanging fruit," he says, "but this fruit is almost on the ground."