Cost of Living – Apparel Crisis

Recently, a friend received a “Remember When” booklet on her birthday. For those that don’t know, they are fun little pamphlets from the year you were born. They’re filled with news, photos, advertisements and other hilarious events form your particular birth year. Well, this one contained a rather amusing, yet slightly depressing, cost of living chart as pictured above. As you can see, a new house was almost 50k in 1977, while today a new home averages 280K, big difference there. Gasoline, which as we all know, has thankfully come down a bit, was $0.65 per/gal back then vs. around $2.68 per/gal today. Food is huge shocker, the cost has unbelievably sky rocketed for groceries, especially in the last few years. Eggs are now six times more expensive then in 1977 and that’s not counting organic pricing. Insanely, bread had gone up to $2.79 per/loaf a whopping 800% increase!

One thing we noticed missing from this chart was, apparel. Where are the clothing prices? Now you would think, with the cost of living rising across the board, including average income, apparel would increase too. Right? Well further into this booklet we found this little gem, a 1977 ad for K-Mart bathing suits, check it out…

Classic photo right? And the price $8.96, not bad right? We were curious though, with mass marketers vying for the lowest price-points, and consumers wanting more for less from retailers, how does a 1977 K-Mart bikini compare to today’s prices? Take a look at the below screen-shot, taken this week from K-Mart’s website.

Well, these images pretty much say it all don’t they? Thirty two years later and prices have not just failed to rise but have actually decreased! The apparel industry is hemorrhaging jobs, suffering bankruptcies left and right, retailers are struggling to stay in the black, and this is a large part of the reason why. Everything else in the world has gone up in price except clothing, it is amazing apparel companies can even stay in business. We thought Walmart’s agenda to, “Make shirts cost less then a loaf of bread” was upsetting, but these pictures really bring the point home.

Our Mannequins, Ourselves

Recently, we came across an interesting report at breitbart.com regarding mannequins. Basically, they interviewed one of the worlds leading producers of mannequins and found that race still plays a prominent role in sales. Worldwide Black mannequins just don’t sell. Other ethnically diverse mannequins don’t fare well either. The one exception seems to be, in the United States, where Black and Asian models are doing decent business. We can’t say, we are exactly surprised by this. At the same time, it’s like, come on people it’s 2009 already!

Oddly, it is not only the White customers keeping diverse mannequins down, but minority groups as well. It seems Asian businesses and countries prefer to purchase the White, European looking, mannequins too. Racism aside, the most disturbing bit of information was this quote, “We only sell headless, limbless, bodies to Saudi customers.” We suppose it’s the all too common images of Middle Eastern women being oppressed and victimized that makes this quote so disconcerting. On the other hand, perhaps they, like many high-end fashion brands, prefer the streamlined look of headless mannequins, so the focus stays on the garment not the mannequin.

For those of us who work in the design and manufacturing side of fashion, mannequins are rarely thought about. They belong to retailers, which are on the complete opposite end of the fashion spectrum from us. What we do have are tailor dummies or body forms, usually headless, and without hands and feet. Unlike mannequins, they are made of fabric and stuffed so that garments can be pinned and fit to them. Our body form’s race is never considered, they are all a dull cream color, which is the natural shade of their cheap unbleached cotton.

When discussing the retail mannequin’s size, a mannequin producer stated, “As for body shapes, every time we try different sizes, it fails. It’s not relevant.” We find this quote quite telling, because for us, size and shape are everything. Often retailers will supply designers and manufactures with body forms or fit models that represent the shape of their customer. Based on extensive market research they will mimic the customer’s actual size from rounder shoulders, or shorter height, or even love handles if applicable. Certain mass-marketers that have a higher population of Black and Hispanic female customers, use a dummy that is slightly shorter, heavier and with a more curvaceous behind. However, in their store the shopper sees tall, slim, white mannequins with flat torsos, large busts, and barely-there hips and bottoms. Basically, the image they present to the public is of a life size Barbie doll. So what kind of message are retailers sending, when they spend thousands of dollars on mannequins, that they know does’t represent their customers either in shape, size, or color?

Please Fire Lindsay Lohan

Really, did anyone think this was a good idea? It’s like a bad nightmare; Ungaro the high fashion brand hires Lindsay Lohan as their designer. Was anybody really surprised when Ungaro’s Paris fashion show became a disaster of epic proportions? What did they expect from a girl who runs around town in ripped tights, grungy tank tops, bad roots, and no panties? Or more to the point, what would any luxury brand be thinking hiring someone with no design experience, marketing maybe? But really, even then, is the drugged out, rapidly ageing, wacktress who you want as the face of your brand? Not shockingly the Ungaro Paris show was panned by critics and considered a total bomb. To see the collection click here.

LiLo has told People Magazine that the Paris catastrophe is not her fault. She said that she was still learning (um, duh) and that she was not given enough time to create a full collection (maybe less time at the clubs stalking your girlfriend and more time working). As for the horrendously tacky nipple tassels, LiLo claims she knew nothing about them until the models were on the runway. Hum, (obvious question) if you really are the designer didn’t you make those nipple tassels, order them, approve them , give them to the models, and see them backstage as you were preparing “your” show? The most upsetting part of this story to us is that Ungaro is keeping her on to design next season’s collection!

How disturbing, when a D-list hot mess of a celebrity gets a fashion dream job, meanwhile hundreds of talented designers go unemployed. In the midst of an economic recession why would any brand give a proven disaster a second chance? So what do you think? Should they fire LiLo? Has Ungaro’s marketing move sullied their name?