Surprising Findings About How People Actually Buy Clothes and Shoes
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This is something I wish more retailers would get. Once I find a pair of shoes that fits me that I like... I really, really don't want to go though that same discovery process 1-2 years down the line. I just want to buy the very same make/model of shoes I've grown accustom to.
If I know these shoes are "perfect" I will simply buy two pairs. If I'm unsure I'll go back a week later for a second pair.
It doesn't stop me from needing to buy new shoes, but it does postpone the process a little!
Otherwise, you've got to find something you like, and buy six of them to stockpile.
Its junk. The seam tape started shelling off the first day, its hanging in tatters. The pockets came unstuck and flap around inside the jacket. No more liners; its not even very water-resistant.
I also thought of my down-filled mummy sleeping bag in the tent, which is c. 1985 and proudly made in China by the Swan company. It works great after all these years, only a little stained by iron oxide and having lost a drawstring from the hood. My father bought a matching pair as a set, and I inherited the other half from my brother, so my wife and I can zip them together and have a cozy sack for two. Modern bags may have a bit more loft and pack a little bit smaller, but not enough to want to replace these.
When breaking camp, I noticed my c. 2013 tent had sheared off an attachment point between the rain fly and the poles. I may try to fix it with some of that crazy tent-repair tape, as I did when it went for a tumble in high winds once. But, I think back to some old tents my family purchased around the same time as my sleeping bag, and am glad to have this amazingly light weight tent instead. Those old ones have probably lost their waterproofing to rot, but their fiberglass poles were so heavy I'd never want to drag it somewhere again.
Shoes on the other hand are a disappointment. I have watched the average life span of hiking shoes decrease rapidly.
The other issue I've had is when finding something I like and that fits, I often can't bulk buy because there's only one or two items actually in stock. Thankfully these days I can often buy the one item in the shop and get the remaining ones online.
Did a similar thing with Allen Edmonds dress shoes. Yes, they were expensive initially, but given how little I wear dress shoes, I wouldn't be surprised if they last me the rest of my life.
Now if only I could find a solution for clothing...
Allen Edmonds are my beater/non-fashion oxfords. I'm going on year five of near-daily wear with them.
They'll last you forever.
I've had less luck with my AE dress shoes, but I think I'm being too harsh on the leather soles.
Here in the UK, CDBs are £80 vs the £200 you're talking about (or $70 vs $170 that I can see on amazon.com).
Basically avoid really cheap, but you don't have to go to $200 though.
Also, we seem to be in a weird spot fashion wise right now. Hipster fashion doesn't seem to be fading. Reddit's MFA (male fashion advice) was recommending chukka boots and white trainers like 6 years ago and we're still there, same with skinny suits, etc.
Fashion, while apparently highly disposable for women, seems to have stabilized for men. MFA talk about "timeless" pieces, but in reality wearing chukkas, white trainers or slim suits in the 90s or early 2000s would have made you look like a plonker. When I was young Doc Martins were cool, then they weren't, now they kinda are again? I also remember Hush Puppies with a particular look were cool that really aren't today.
Same with dress shoes too, black, square fronted dress shoes were considered good, while pointy brown dress shoes were incredibly old fashioned. Now it's the other way around.
That said, those crepe soles are like ice skates in the wet...
CBDs and white shoes are definitely on their way out, but it will take years for that to happen, whereas women's fashion changes very quickly.
Source: wife works in production for both men's and women's fashion.
I got a pair of their work boots (1412, specifically) five years ago. I've worn them pretty much every day since then, and they're still perfectly usable.
Except mine DEFINITELY look a little aged on account of all the daily romps in the woods I do, lots of mud and wet grass. Most other shoes would've been long destroyed by now, though (looking at you, Doc Martens "fashion" boots).
The average person is probably better off just buying a 30 dollar pair at Target and putting 470 bucks into the stock-market.
Where Allen Edmond shoes are the real winner is compared to the shoes a level or two below them. Like Cole Haan. They last a lot longer but only cost twice as much.
Not dealing with the hassle of shoe-shopping every 6 months? Totally worth the money.
And time is money too.
Also, get factory seconds and you'll pay WAY less than $500 for a good pair of shoes. I think it was $~200 for me.
So if something starts looking a wee bit tatty I should just be able to use an app to get a replacement next day.
Completely agree - I'd want the same thing, not a crappy version of the same product you sold 2 years ago for the same price - which I suspect rules out a lot of clothes retailers.
I do that a lot in other sections in life too, I buy crappy solder because I know it works well for me even though people are telling me this solder is crap and my house will burn down and I'll get lead cancer...
[1] https://www.landsend.com/products/mens-all-weather-moc-shoes... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17337829
I've always been fascinated by a particular finger of land in the SF Bay just north of the San Mateo Bridge, west of the channel that goes under the bridge. It's quite some distance from the Foster City shore. I waded out to that finger on the day of lowest tide about ten years ago and walked to the northernmost point one day, with my junk Sambas ... it's probably the loneliest spot in the bay area without getting into the hills, except you can wave to the commuters on the bridge. I didn't bother to clean up that pair when done.
Same for my shoes- I have a pair I like, and when they got old I went back to the same store and got the same shoes again, identical.
It sure makes getting dressed far easier in the morning.
Black T Shirt (5 every 4 months), Raw Denim Jeans (1 every 9 months), gray tank top (4 every 4 months), athletic shorts (1 every 6 months), everyday underwear (3 every 4 months), athletic underwear (2 every 4 months), athletic socks (3 pairs every 6 months), dress socks (3 pairs every 6 months).
It's great for a lot of reasons. Less time picking clothes, less time shopping for clothes, and something is worn out or stained I can discard it without stress.
- I buy basic clothing from a famous sports store, and they change a large part of the articles essentially every year, even the underwear; - I tried to buy a trousers with the same model of 3/4 years before, from a rather famous (in the country I live in) brand, and it was not available anymore; - I tried to buy t-shirts with the same model of 3/4 years before, again from another rather famous brand, and it's not available anymore. - My runners are a certain model from a very famous brand, which produces a new version every 1-2 years; I thought at least the size would be the same: nope.
The worst is when it has the same name and cosmetically looks the same, but you realize they've changed over to a lower quality manufacturer and it's nowhere near as well made.
Edit: I bought APC jeans last time and the cost (and how good they look once worn in) was worth getting them repaired. Next time I can afford to spend a bit more, I'll probably go for Nudie - mostly because of their free repairs for life policy, which I think is amazing: https://www.nudiejeans.com/page/free-repairs-for-life
But like you said, it is very annoying because I like to just buy what I already know works, and it's not possible at many retailers any more.
Just did some quick googling for "custom tailored jeans" and there seems to be a few things out there, but not sure how good the service is. Might be worth a try
Now when I find a pair I like, after a few months to ensure I like them, I buy 3 more pairs. Been doing this for about 5 years now.
Interestingly I have found it doesn't always work. Perhaps the materials age or there are differences in production batches, but I have the same exact shoe (from model number) from Lowe and some are comfortable and pliant, and others are not, and some are waterproof and others feel like they are made of a screen door.
Shame, that.
Fact: Some consumers like reliable consistency, while others prefer following fashion trends. Many consumers do both at different stages of their lives, years, and days.
They had me for life, then didn't.
So I buy a few of varying colors but this is the extra effort I would like to avoid.
I tried this with my first son when he was a few days old. One pajama (or whatever it is called) was great so I went back to the shop and bought 10 of them. Then went back to the shop to return them after my wife explained to me a few facts of life.
Shout out to the people who can afford to shop at stores with a business model that supports "sales associates" that actually do something besides take your money (or help unlock a dressing room) I can't remember the last time I was helped personally while shopping for clothing.
I always say no though - it feels awkward.
Here in Romania, I feel it is only half of the time the case.I had plenty of helpful interaction with employees both being asked if I need help or directly going and asking for help. I also had plenty of unhelpful interaction with uninformed employees or uninterested employees.
At least in the westernized countries I believe the more Mediterranean a culture the more helpful store employees try to appear (even though they may not actually be).
Often it seems I know more of what to look out for than the sales associate, making the help moot.
I don't generally think of JC Penney as being a store high-end enough that most people would feel they can't afford to shop there...
I think it's a personal preference. The isle model requires less labor but the wall model uses less real estate.
No one came over, when I eventually went off and got someone they were do disinterested we gave up and left. I went to a small shop over the road where a slick haired, pot bellied, mahogany skinned but very suave Italian really looked after him and he got a got a lovely and perfectly fitted suit. It wasn't that expensive either, just over £200 I think.
It was really sad to see what a great institution like Moss Bros had become, there are still shops out there but we need to ensure they can stay in business if we want that service.
I would hate stores to implement half of the recommendations. Swiping my smartphone on entry?!
I'd prefer to shop at the distributor's warehouse.
And can we stop measuring the growth/success of the economy by how many redundant items are bought?
We need people to mindlessly buy stuff they don't want want/need in order to grow our <strike>house of cards</strike> economy.
The latter - measuring growth/success of an economy by redundant items bought, is a direct consequence of applying the same principle for individuals. This phenomenon, at the micro level, could, with the appropriate disclaimers, be considered the root cause for the general maladies you point out.
Do you believe individuals could be trained/convinced/taught to not measure their success in those terms?
If yes, would they still get to measure their successes? If so, in terms of what? What would you consider a better universal metric for personal success?
Then again, the fact that anyone had to do a study to figure this out is indicative of a bigger disconnect between business people and their customers than I expected.
I'd caution you against assuming that business people don't know this. This article is just a marketing post for Oliver Wyman (a management consulting firm).
Most stores seem to redesign their clothing ranges for both women and men annually, and then make a big deal of it.
There are a few exceptions, like branded jeans with stable styles, and no-brand generic staples like tees and polos.
But generally when you find an article you like, it disappears within a few months.
It's astounding that clothing retail has been around for centuries, but hardly anyone has considered that at least some customers might prefer a stable product range.
One way to do that is to change the fashion regularly in order to apply social pressure to not wearing older clothing.
Another way appears to be making clothes very thin so they wear out quicker.
Of something is good, but not great, you'll but from that brand again -- and I bet sooner.
When it comes to online shopping, which makes up a majority of my clothing purchases now, these facts from the article are very important:
1. Spend is dramatically higher at brand stores and websites than in multibrand stores.
2. Very often, they are happy to rebuy the same or a similar item.
3. Most journeys are still overwhelmingly single-channel, though this is changing.
For me, finding clothes that fit right can be difficult. I'm tall enough that many shirts are too short but many tall sizes are too long. Most brick-and-mortar stores don't stock tall sizes, so I had to go online to even try them. Since it's enough of a pain, I've settled on two or three brands whose sizing I know can work for me.
If I were to shop somewhere like Macys or Macys.com, I'm dealing with several dozen brands, each with different sizing. If I stick with a brand, say Banana Republic or Gap, it's substantially easier and I'd tend to spend more money at one place rather than buying pieces here and there. On the other hand, I do not like online returns at all, so I try and stick with brands that have a physical presence I can utilize for returns.
Additionally, many stores offer really great discounts that can be hard to parse and take advantage of in stores. They may have a %-off coupon valid for certain things, in combination with BOGO discounts that you can stack for big savings. Toying with that in an online shopping cart is really easy but is much more of a hassle in a store.
I don't need the silly vanity of thinking I got some amazing "deal" at 40% off when your prices are clearly just inflated by 40+% across the board to start with. It's a tremendous waste of my time to have to figure out which items qualify for which promotions, only to be disappointed at checkout by some technicality.
Even worse is finally picking a few hundred dollars worth of clothing to buy only to find out none of the normal sizes are in stock. I cannot believe how many retailers are still failing the absolute basics like inventory, yet insist on investing billions in tracking everything we do, everywhere we go to hijack our privacy and attention with ads.
Something that's not addressed in the article, but I have noticed about myself is that I am more likely to order multiple sizes of a piece of clothing online, and return all but the piece that fits the best. That might contribute to larger purchase sizes. Sites like amazon make this particularly easy.
Also, legality of it all... name brand stuff here is usually some level of fake. For example, the labels, patterns and fabrics may be from the factory (likely removed without knowledge), but they were assembled by the same factory people, working out of a shop in their living room.
I bought a nice Pull&Bear t-shirt the other day for 100k vnd / $4.39.
The problem with this is marketing. Today, there is no effective way of targeted marketing for those 80%. That's a shame and there are tools to solve it, one is coalition loyalty programs. It's like a store loyalty program but for a coalition of stores. An important European brand for such a program is payback.
I'm working on improving such a programs (and there aren't many, and this in spite of 80% store purchases) by making it location and customer-aware and suitable for even small businesses to enter the coalition. Currently it's a working server back end and I need another 2-4 months to come up with a good demo. I'm looking for potential clients and/or strategic investors to make it a real product if anyone is interested.
email in profile.
Nope. This is almost never true when someone writes it on HN.
When shopping, women tend to go to many different stores comparing items and prices at each one and then at the end, they go back to the one they liked best and buy it. Men on the other hand already know exactly what they want and so they go straight to the store that has what they want, buy it, and leave.
It is especially fun when you tell that to a group of guys and girls. My dad, brothers and I were so for the 'get in and get out' strategy but the girls were all talking about how it is fun to look at all the different options and look for good deals.
Can confirm that I spend more time trying to get better deal then men I know who buy first regardless of price.
Recently, I found that I like LL Bean for the style, quality, and sizing for both business and casual. So I'm slowly revamping my wardrobe and intend to replace pieces more often.
Shoes, however, I am still going in-person to find. I have a pair of podiatrist-made inserts to deal with my collapsing arches. It's devilishly tough trying to account for them when purchasing online.
She orders a ton of clothes online and then returns something around 75% of it. They give her free shipping and they take the returns in store at no cost. She prefers to order when there are sales.
What she is doing is completely logical and encouraged by their policies but I do not understand how they make any money?
Someone returning 75% of the clothing they buy because of a generous return policy is better than nobody buying anything from that retailer at all.
https://www.fastcompany.com/1614648/zappos-best-customers-ar...
Don't worry, they are still making money on your wife.
(This is just based on my experience working for a major outdoor clothing retailer, not any sort of real data)
You are obviously a facist or punk for wearing uncapitalistic everlasting boots.
"I mean, really, how often do you look at a man's shoes?"
--Shawshank Redemption.