Sears Canada Catalogue injustice...

[BrotherTailor]

I had to run an errand for a lady in a wheelchair yesterday, and was at the parcel desk in a Sears catalogue outlet (a little cubbyhole at the back of another store) and thought I
I'd pick up the thick Fall and Winter catalogue for market research. It has been 10 years since I've looked at a Sears catalogue.

I was actually very impressed with the styles I saw, especially in the way of skirts, sweaters, jackets, dresses. I also noted that almost all the waistlines on the trousers/jeans were quite high, I can't recall more than one or two lowrise models. Anyhow, I'm impressed.

What startled me was two things: the way the men's and ladies clothes were portrayed and the sheer number of choices ladies have compared to men.
Display. The ladies clothes were all modelled. Even the least important items were carefully modelled to give you an accurate "in the round" view of the garment. The men's clothes were mostly NOT modelled, and all the (quite nice) suits were just hung on a "peg" a headless dressform. "hell, that'll work as good as a guy"... Most of the dress shirts were pictured folded on the cardboard rectangle. Jeans were "hung" in midair in side profile. I was quite puzzled, again not having been a catalogue shopper for a long time.
The second thing was the huge selection of ladies clothes in terms of styles, colours, shapes, variety overall, in misses, a plus sizes etc. It ran to 243 pages. The men's totalled 90 pages of tan and navy dockers and cargo pants, a couple of suits and the rest was denim jeans and brand name "active wear" (sweatshirts, fleece, stuff I'd never wear). The only curious/interesting item for men was on the last page, a "kilt style wrap" in green terrycloth for around the house or after a shower, it was sold along with bathrobes.

Of interest to men in the ladies section might be the shirtdress, belted and coming to the knee on pg. 73., and the cargo skirt on pg. 74. Although the selection is excellent throughout in my estimation. I noticed quite a few asymmetric skirt and dress designs, and a few wrap style tops that were that way also, very nice.

O, to be a woman...the world is your oyster.... Will we ever see this imbalance rectified? Will the way large firms treat their male customers ever rise to the level of deference and respect shown to their female conterparts? I don't think so....not until men start taking an active interest in fashion for themselves.

[JRMILLER]

I am with you! I have been spending a lot more time looking into catalogs and I am blown away by the choices!

Most online stores have things grouped into categories, so when I am flipping through the categories it's color, options, options, colors, cool!

Just look at bras for instance, why would anyone even care what color your bra is? Well, they have all colors of the rainbow available, just walking through a dept store is like walking through the candy aisle because of the colors!

I had really never given skirts much of a thought, but when I started shopping for skirts I once again encountered the incredible number of colors and options! I tried a few on and fell in love with them on first sight! I have never really liked pants, I just put up with them. Shopping for pants is ALWAYS the most boring thing I can think of to do. It's liking watching water drop from a faucet! If pants were available in the same fabrics, colors and styles as skirts, it would be an entirely different matter. Shopping would be fun!

-john

[SkirtDude]

deleted

[sapphire]

<timid><weak><helpless<nonthreatening>the world is not my oyster</nonthreatening</helpless>,</weak></timid>

nor has it ever been.

Fellas, on one hand you say you want the support of women in your quest to achieve fashion freedom and then some of you turn around and make disparaging comments

Please, please, pretty please with marshmallows and whipped cream and a cherry on top stop making disparaging comments about women if you want them in your world.

Fashion is what you create, marketing is what ends up on the racks.

[BrotherTailor]

I was making my remarks strictly in accordance with the thread topic - catalogue selections.

What specifically did you find "disparaging" sapphire? (keeping in mind the thread title, my frame of reference, and the entire context of the post)

I'd rather not spend all my time on here discussing women's rights and walking on cracked eggs around those with victim complexes

[BrotherTailor]

And in light of that, I think I shall bow out temporarily. My schedule is rather heavy for the next 3 weeks, and perhaps some time silent and apart will refocus me. I shall leave you all to carry on.

[Peter v]

<timid><weak><helpless<nonthreatening>the world is not my oyster</nonthreatening</helpless>,</weak></timid>

nor has it ever been.

Fellas, on one hand you say you want the support of women in your quest to achieve fashion freedom and then some of you turn around and make disparaging comments

Please, please, pretty please with marshmallows and whipped cream and a cherry on top stop making disparaging comments about women if you want them in your world.

Fashion is what you create, marketing is what ends up on the racks.

Hallo Saphire, delicious, thanks for the treat, marshmallows and whipped cream and a cherry on top. I don't know of any disparaging comments, and of course, not all women have it as good or as easy as others, if that is what you mean, but to us men, looking on to the possibilitys which women have in clothing at their disposal, and looking at how the market tends to their "needs" as compared to mens, it's like finding Aladin's cave. Finding Aladin's cave is great and sensational, having to sweep it clean every morning would take us running.

Is the grass greener on the other side? It is sometimes. And we see that, also we on this forum see, or at least understand somewhat how it got that way. So we talk about the abundance, and how the marketing differs from that of men's products. And then we want to know how to get the same green grass on our own fields.

You are right, "Fashion is what you create, marketing is what ends up on the racks." but at this moment, we, as a minority, are able only to see what is possible, looking to the women's side. And are trying to get somehow enough attention and leverage to get things rolling on the men's side, men skirt wearers side.

If I'm talking about things which you didn't mean, please say so.

friendly regards,
Peter v.

[Peter v]

I had to run an errand for a lady in a wheelchair yesterday, and was at the parcel desk in a Sears catalogue outlet (a little etc.

I agree fully, why have different advertising techniques for men and women? Men's fashion sells less than women's so they probably put more energy in women's advertising than men's. Men's fashin may be dull, in comparison to women's, but we still have the right to be treated equally. But that still is NO excuse for not presenting the men's fashion in the same way as the women's. Who understands that? But advertising differs. I have seen many pictures of skirts and other women's garments, badly lit, so that details can't be seen, for example a skirt, which is covered by a long vest, so that the waist and pockets if any cannot be seen, and the hem is not even in the picture. They apparently are not interested in selling? Same goes for your catalogus. They probably think men buy anyway. They just buy to replace worn out clothes with the same again. Still not understandable.

How it got that way, don't ask me.
Men don't care much, not as much as women, don't change fashion so easily, so don't buy as much so are not so interesting as women are to sell to.

What is understandable is that women are more fashion minded, and are therefore manipulated by the manufacturers, it's a gold mine. It's great to see something new nearly every week in the shop, fashion changing fast, but that has it's down side, being that everything you already have, becomes obsolete, so it's actually a burden, to unconciously have to spend all your cash on new clothes nearly every week to keep up with the fashion. The fashion people are really pushing their product, but that also goes for practically all our consumer products. Push push. Sell Sell.

So while this is going on, we men see what the women have to choose from, and we appreciate the choice, and looking at what we have to choose from in the men's clothing is just shamefull in comparison.

Why the apparent lack of interest in men's fashion as compared to women's? Or is this only Sear's catalogus?
Any Ideas?

peter v.

[crfriend]

[Men don't care much, not as much as women, don't change fashion so easily, so don't buy as much so are not so interesting as women are to sell to.

Well, coming at this from the perspective of almost a half-century, I'll confirm that most guys are completely utilitarian in their clothing, and until very recently I fit that bill to a "T". Guys' clothes are there to cover, keep warm, and occasionally protect, but very little else. With the demise of dress codes in the workplace (and the demise of the traditional professional-level jobs that went along with them) mens' clothing has become even more utilitarian and less showy. The net effect is that eventually all mens' clothes might be able to be displayed on two or three pages with a single photo and a "choice" of colours ticked off in a text list.

Manufacturers and marketers know the above, and being savvy about were to spend the advertising buck do it for womens' clothes. This is understandable, and makes good business sense -- why spend money trying to push something functional that gets replaced only when it wears out, and will get replaced whether money gets spent actively pushing it? Am I somehow "offended" by this? No. I understand it. Would it make a difference to me if mens' clothes were marketed more aggressively? Probably not, unless things started popping up that weren't the functional utilitarian stuff that makes up mens' "fashion" now.