Sometimes more is less. Like when you’re shopping for jeans and you’re faced with a dizzying array of choices.
At The Gap, for instance, there are 11 different styles of women’s jeans: Resolution True Skinny, Resolution Slim Straight, Girlfriend, Authentic Boyfriend, Sexy Boyfriend, Leggy Jean, Always Skinny, Real Straight, Perfect Boot, Long and Lean, Curvy Skinny. I have no idea what these names mean, and there’s no point in finding out because there will be new choices the next time I go.
There are a lot of theories about why The Gap is doing so badly that it has to close 175 stores this year, but here’s mine: The retail giant has made it impossible for women who want to wear the same thing they wore last year and the year before and 10 years before that.
You wouldn’t think this was a big demographic. Don’t women love shopping? Well, yes, when we have time. It’s not that we don’t enjoy buying a pretty dress or a fun top every now and then. But there are certain basics that need to be replaced year in and year out. And we’d rather not have to spend our time figuring out whether an Authentic Boyfriend makes our rear end look too big or if we wear a size 8 or 10 in a Resolution Slim Straight.
But this is exactly what women go through every season. We grew up shopping at places like The Gap and J.Crew, stores that had a stock of jeans and khakis that largely looked the same year after year. We have been inhabiting our bodies for more than 20 years now and we pretty much know what looks good.
Shopping for pants will continue to be a pain in the ass.
We don’t need “mom jeans,” but no amount of curvy skinniness is going to erase the effects of childbearing. Still, the designers working for these companies don’t seem to believe us.
And somewhere along the line, things started to spiral out of control.
A recent article in The Wall Street Journal chronicled how shoppers at J.Crew have been disappointed by the changes in sizing, style and pricing of the store’s inventory. One woman even said that she is more likely to buy J.Crew items at consignment shops than in the stores. “I want to invest in classic pieces,” she says.
But it is increasingly impossible to find them. When I purchase a pair of pants that I like and wear them for a few months, a sense of dread overcomes me. I can go back to the store — Banana Republic, Ann Taylor, you name it — but I will not be able to find the same ones again. It is hard to build a loyal customer base if you can’t offer some consistency.
And the results are clear. Same-store sales at J.Crew are down 10% from last year, and the company is eliminating 175 jobs. Analysts suggest that there a number of problematic trends for stores like The Gap and J.Crew. First, people are shunning the mall for online shopping. Second, there seems to be growth at the luxury end of women’s wear and at the cheap end. But not so much in the middle.
So, what’s a women’s clothing store to do? I fear the cure will be worse than the disease. One analyst suggests that J.Crew should have embraced the “athleisure” craze. If only they had joined the other stores offering yoga pants as appropriate for almost any occasion, they would have succeeded? God help us all.
I’m not one to cry sexism at the drop of a hat, but you know who gets to buy the same style and size of clothes year after year? Men. If they like a particular shirt at Brooks Brothers, they can just order a half-dozen of them. And when those wear out, a half-dozen more. Sure if they want to try out a new style of khakis they can, but no one is forcing them to see if they like curvy leggy slim straight boot cuts.
For women, though, even the poor performance of these stores probably won’t change much. Shopping for pants will continue to be a pain in the ass.