Show HN: Hoodie App is Men's Clothing in Two Taps | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Hoodie App is Men's Clothing in Two Taps

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40 pointspkrein40 comments

I have a hard time believing there is a large group of people that are this lazy as well as careless with money that they would use this for their clothing.

> All purchases are final, absolutely no returns will be accepted. We're both too lazy to deal with that.

To me, that just sounds like you don't even care about the customer. But that could just be me as I actually do care about being happy with something I've bought with my own money.

I just don't see this as something that will take off. Especially as men are becoming more fashion aware.

That's a good point on the copy there -- a joke that fell flat ;) I've edited it in the next release, but no returns for the time being.

I hope the FTC doesn't come knocking, because I'm pretty sure it's illegal to not accept returns in the case of defective merchandise. I suppose you don't technically need to accept returns, you just need to refund buyers who receive something that's defective...either way, it seems like something you should have a policy on.

Return policies like that are more typical of lingerie sites for obvious reasons. If I had to guess, the real reason for that return policy is they don't want to worry about people returning things they wore for a night out and decided afterwards that they want their money back. Maybe they'll put some kind of highly-visible tag on the clothes and if the tag is removed then they won't let you return the items. Seems reasonable to me (a `no tag, no refund` policy).

I know here in the US many brick-and-mortar stores have a 'no tag, no return' policy - although I'm not sure it's rigorously enforced, it's more there to stop obviously worn garments from being returned (I just returned a pair of jeans to Uniqlo that I'd taken the tags off, despite the fact the receipt did say no tag, no refund).

In my experience, return policies here have become more lax in regards to the time frame of when you can return something, and whether it needs a tag or not.

A recent example of this is when I've dealt with ASOS. Even though they're primarily a UK based company, they offer free shipping and free returns here in the US (also something I see becoming more common). But on top of that, even though the return policy says within a certain timeframe, emailing their customer support about a month after the return cut off period, they told me as long as the item is in sellable condition I could still return it. They literally told me that "Here are ASOS, we're not monsters" which I found kind of cute. But overall that's close to the best customer service I've had in a while (return/shipping wise).

Going back to the free returns though. I feel like this is the last major pain point in online shopping that hasn't been dealt with yet. Amazon for instance, returns are free by default on clothing and a few other categories of items. Items that are damaged, or something is wrong with the item that is not your fault gets free return shipping. But what if you just don't like it? Well no free return shipping for you. I can't imagine the amount of people that could potentially abuse a free return system could have any significant impact over the amount of profit and new customers a store could get from reassuring their customers that they care about if you're happy with your purchase or not, and offering the safety net of free returns for your purchases.

Within the EU, there are some fairly favourable (for the customer) return policies mandated by law. Even if you technically extended the time for return (and that you probably aren't covered in the US), most companies here would just err on the side of caution and grant your return in edge cases like this. Esp. large retailers such as ASOS.

> Especially as men are becoming more fashion aware.

That's a fairly broad generalisation about men. Different people care about different things. Some are happy to wear anything comfortable, some care about the choice.

There may be a big enough niche for people who really don't care about clothes as long as they aren't bad. I would happily do that for food for example... I know many people care deeply about food and like to cook, but if someone let me just exclude food I hate and shipped a randomised meal every day at a reasonable price, I'd be a happy customer.

> I know many people care deeply about food and like to cook, but if someone let me just exclude food I hate and shipped a randomised meal every day at a reasonable price, I'd be a happy customer.

https://campaign.soylent.me/soylent-free-your-body

Yes, I know, not exactly randomized meals. Baby steps.

Do you mean cooked or just the ingredients and what would be a fair price to you? I'm building a product in this space and am interested in your thoughts.

Cooked, ready. I see the whole preparing/eating process as a waste of time every day. Fair price? I guess slightly above the "ready meal" boxes from supermarkets, but also a bit higher quality.

I never heard of gobble before and quite like the idea. The only thing I'd ask for (can't see it on their overview) is define the ingredient likes/dislikes rather than cuisine style. So something like "shellfish: not at all; beans: great; ...".

Check out Gobble. I think they're just in Mountain View at the moment, but I could be wrong.

I'm pretty sure there are state laws whereby you must allow some refunds (defective item, etc).

Hi from https://www.twotap.com :) You can enable this for 100+ retailers -- https://twotap.com/supported-stores -- with full return support too.

Will you be enforcing your trademark?

Minimally (i.e. small logo).

This seems like something that will only work for someone who views clothing as 100% utilitarian and does not care about how they look. The sizing, fit, and style aspects are really hard to do right for clothing where people care about their style and other players seem to have shipping basics on-demand nailed down. (e.g. MeUndies, ManPacks - although none seem to have a mobile app so maybe you can just compete on user acq. in that channel)

1. I don't know of any brand of jeans that sells for $40-80 that fits well and looks good. (I'd say Flint & Tinder is the closest and they come in at $105)

2. How do you size tees, tee sizing varies widely across brands? How does jean sizing work, are the jeans bootcut, straight leg, slim straight? (you also have 35's as a waist size which basically nobody but Bonobos produces)

3. Are you matching the shoes to my style somehow (or the other clothes you are sending) or are they just some random pair of shoes?

4. How are undershirts and t-shirts different?

5. Are you shipping me sneakers or shoes? If shoes are they oxfords? desert boots? something else? If anything but sneakers are you shipping dress socks to go with them or are you still shipping athletic socks?

> 1. I don't know of any brand of jeans that sells for $40-80 that fits well and looks good. (I'd say Flint & Tinder is the closest and they come in at $105)

I'm going to go out on a limb and say this is not for you.

Levi's 501 STF (shrink to fit), can be had on sale <$50. Very flattering jeans if you break them in correctly and thoroughly enjoy mine.

(coming from a person who used to rock Dior mij 19cm's growing up)

replied to comment, but yeah this app would appeal to people who will wear anything

  I don't know of any brand of jeans that sells for $40-80 that fits well and looks good. (I'd say Flint & Tinder is the closest and they come in at $105)

I know HN's not the place for fashion advice but shop at Uniqlo. High quality affordable Japanese denim with free hemming on-site.

Uniqlo is awesome. I meant nothing that you can buy at wholesale (where you actually can make margin on the sale) that sells for less than $90.

I've never tried their jeans, but while I rather like Uniqlo, their stuff is generally not high quality. I think the appropriate term is "cheap and cheerful."

I actually buy a lot of stuff there, but for anything I really like, I often buy two or three of it because I know from experience that it will wear out rather quickly (and luckily they're so cheap that buying multiple copies is quite practical).

20Jeans is also good and has fairly high quality clothes. Most of the Jeans are in the $20-30 range.

Interesting! Those actually look really nice (the $65 ones).

Looks like another brand that only enables this pricing by going direct-to-consumer though. Unfortunately that makes them impossible to buy from as a 3rd party reseller (their model doesn't support markups wholesalers would need so these kind of companies generally do not sell to wholesalers)

> 1. I don't know of any brand of jeans that sells for $40-80 that fits well and looks good. (I'd say Flint & Tinder is the closest and they come in at $105)

Wow, I don't think I've ever spent more than $50 for jeans. Admittedly, I don't really care how they look as long as they are comfortable.

1. Levi 511s for slender folks qualify.

> I don't know of any brand of jeans that sells for $40-80 that fits well and looks good. (I'd say Flint & Tinder is the closest and they come in at $105)

The vast majority of people wouldn't recognize the different between a $30 and a $500 pair of jeans on the street. They wouldn't even think to wonder, because they have no good reason to care. You are certainly welcome to hold yourself to higher standards--Lord knows I'm picky about things nobody else cares about--but don't assume your standards are objective or universal.

I agree with most of your other complaints, though. My dress sense is pretty lackadaisical, but I know from experience that most manufacturers view things like "inches" as sort of a vague ballpark, not a firm measurement. They're too incompetent to be trusted without a return policy.

> The vast majority of people wouldn't recognize the different between a $30 and a $500 pair of jeans on the street

I suspect most women could tell you the difference between $30 and $200 jeans easily. Maybe not in passing, but certainly in person. You actually see huge leaps in quality between $50 and $200 in terms of both material and construction quality. Anything significantly above $200 and you're just buying brand though so the differentiation is harder (and less meaningful).

As with most things you wear though $50 jeans that fit beat out $400 jeans that don't any day.

Those prices are about 3x what I would normally pay for basic, casual clothing. I'm from Cincinnati though, so perhaps everything is a lot more expensive elsewhere, or maybe I'm just really cheap.

I don't like shopping much, but if I'm not being picky, it doesn't take very long to get in and out of a store, so even disregarding the price, this isn't that appealing to me. It might be more appealing if the app promised to make me look good without the effort of shopping. Just because I'm feeling lazy doesn't mean I want the person picking out my clothing to be lazy too. Keep the simplicity of the app, but go the extra mile for me. Take my sizes, but also get my age, a few snapshots, my general taste in clothing, and then really tailor your picks to me. That's something I might pay a premium for.

Maybe try Bombfell? http://www.bombfell.com/

It's too expensive for me, but they do what you describe.

That looks almost exactly like what I was describing. Thanks for pointing it out.

I would probably be willing to try it except for the fact that it's subscription based. If I forget to cancel my subscription after the first month (which I will) I will either end up with more clothing than I want or the hassle of having to return the clothing.

Wait so you can't buy hoodies? Uninstalled.

So...

* No way to edit sizes

* No way to go back

* Login doesn't save credentials.

* No hoodie

* No sizes for shirts

So, basically, an app built in a weekend. Grats on that, but you really need to put more work into it. It's still fairly raw, and the lack of quality pretty much doesn't instill much trust in paying for things that are fairly high in price for something I "hate" to shop for.

Indeed, it's an early version, and really appreciate your feedback on what you'd like to see. Thanks!

I like the idea. I just think it needs work. As such I've left the app installed. :)

Hit the link from this on my phone. It sends me to the App Store but never loads (I'm in NZ - I suspect I can't get the app). Double tap back to the HN app and it loads and instantly redirects back to the non-loading App Store. Had to force quit the HN app to get out of the nasty loop.

Pretty interesting idea, good luck! Customer service and returns are pretty important though.

can we Show HN the actual web site vs. an app?

http://gethoodie.com/ - offline

woop, fixed thanks.

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