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As the economy continues to slumber, fashionistas of all ages are following their muse to edgy retailers with trendy goods and exciting prices.
If the economic downturn has accomplished anything positive, it’s a willingness of the American consumer to pursue her own muse, define her own fashion sense.
“High-end apparel used to drive this sector,” says Bess Anderson, director of visual strategy at Chute Gerdeman Retail (Columbus, Ohio). “But most people are trading down, prioritizing their purchases. And in the process, they’re finding their own personalities, mixing labels, adding vintage items.”
Anderson says it has become cool and chic to find bargains and brag about them. “People used to say, ‘Oh, I love that Gucci jacket you’re wearing. Is it from Barneys?’ ” says Anderson. “Now, the conversation is more likely to be, ‘How cute is that, where did you find it?’ And the answer – that it was purchased in a thrift store on The Bowery somewhere – is a badge not only of great shopping but also of great taste.”
Who’s benefiting from this trend? The names that keep bobbing up are H&M and Forever 21 – and not just because of their notoriously low prices. “They’re able to get goods quickly from the fashion runways into their stores,” says Lee Peterson, executive vp, creative services, at WD Partners (Dublin, Ohio). “Something that came out in Milan in May can be on their shelves in June, thus giving this kind of retail the name ‘fast fashion.’ ”
These aren’t the actual designer goods, of course. They’re clever copies of the original cuts, fabrics, colors and designs. But they’re close enough to the real thing, and offered at so tempting a price, that they become what Peterson calls “must-haves.”
“You see it in Forever 21 one day and you know you’ve got to buy it, right then!” he says. “It might not be there the next week, or even the next day. Or it might not be in another Forever 21 store you go into.”
In an economic environment in which most retailers are snoozing, the huge new Forever 21 flagship store in New York – a four-story, 91,000-square-foot megastore – has been pulsating with crowds until 2 a.m. nearly every day since it opened in Times Square in June, the largest retail venue in Manhattan devoted to a single brand.
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