Green attributes his success not to cheap acquisitions but to a lifetime of plying the rag trade.

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Their work included the BBC hit The Rag Trade, which also starred Varney.

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In 1970, after some 25 years of growing success in the rag trade, he launched himself as Bill Blass Ltd.

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Or Paul Drayson, the head of England's Powderject Pharmaceuticals who dresses in the khaki and gray casual outfits that the men's rag trade has labeled nerdware.

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Only a few scraps of the rag trade remain, but in 1958, before the advent of credit cards, Burton's had the bright idea of store cards.

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Many in the rag trade said it was an aberration.

ECONOMIST: British fashion

Yes, his story is one from the rag trade to the rich list but it is unconventional in that his fortune was made outside of the fast-growing emerging markets.

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By focusing only on the rag trade, Mr Clinton seemed to turn a blind eye to the conditions endured by (largely illegal) immigrants in businesses such as restaurants and retailing.

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Goldman Sachs has a long history in lower Manhattan, from Marcus Goldman providing short-term financing to the nineteenth-century rag trade on the Lower East Side to signs carried around the present occupation of a park at Broadway and Cedar Street.

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