[coldtea]

>Like, why doesn't the market solve for this? If the median woman can't buy clothing that fits in many brands, surely that's a huge marketing opportunity for any of the thousands of other clothing brands?

Because

- in reality it's not much of a problem. Billions of women manage to buy and wear clothes just fine. Some might fit slightly better or worse, but unless you have very special body shape (and even extreme thick/overweight/tall/short are covered by niche brands) you can get in any clothes store and get plenty of clothes to wear

- some random brand making something that fits better doesn't mean any sizeable consumer percentage is going to buy it. First because see above, and also because a lot of clothes purchases are about brand and fashion and status signalling, not mere fit.

- if some women absolutely can't find something in their size from a specific brand, that makes the brand even more exclusive, like it being "for fit people only". Obviously brands for thicker and even obese people also exist, but they're seen as a brand of need, not a brand you'd be proud having to wear

[roenxi]

> if some women absolutely can't find something in their size from a specific brand, that makes the brand even more exclusive, like it being "for fit people only"

The elephants in the room from the raw data is it is very clear some brands do not want average middle aged women wearing their products. Anthropology seems to be the most clear about this in that they have a literal gap between their standard and plus-sized ranges that excludes the adult median woman.

Now some brands might do that out of snobishness, but I expect there is a feedback loop here:

1) Young, attractive women want to make fashion choices that signal they are young, attractive women.

2) They buy from fashion lines that don't fit average adult women.

3) Average adult women detect that the fashionable choice is these brands and feel left out, because a fair number of them would also like to be young and attractive again. And a small but significant fraction feel really left out if some clothing brand calls them a size 20 waist / fat / shaped like a rectangle. Clothing brands detect this in their customer studies and respond appropriately.

4) People who just want clothes buy from H&M or wherever and don't write articles about how hard it is to fit clothes.

"Women" isn't really a homogeneous category when it comes to clothing, there is ongoing fierce competition between lots of different sub-groups of the female population to signal lots of different things. Men have it a bit easier because there is basically a 4-quadrant choice between upper & lower class, formal & casual with a lot of intricacy for people who care a lot about what brand of black leather shoe they own. Young girls are closer to men in that they aren't really trying to signal anything at that age, so clothing fits are a lot easier to manage.

[orbisvicis]

> Clothing brands detect this in their customer studies and respond appropriately.

Respond how?

> lots of different sub-groups of the female population to signal lots of different things

Signal what?

[roenxi]

> Respond how?

By destandardising sizes. It isn't that hard to standardise if an industry thinks it'll help them; the article suggests there is already a relevant standards body. These companies are probably doing it for a reason. My guess would be maybe someone doesn't want to be an XXL 18 at J Crew so they can go to Reformation where they are more of a Regular 14.

> Signal what?

Age, health and status for women. Group membership too although that is generally to a lesser extent.

[orbisvicis]

> By destandardising sizes

Oh. I thought there was an outside chance you intended a positive response. Ah well.

> Age, health and status

I can understand age. But wouldn't everyone want to signal good health and high status?

[roenxi]

> I can understand age. But wouldn't everyone want to signal good health and high status?

Yeah, but generally not with fashion. Male fashion tends not to go to the same sort of lengths to showcase legs/torsos/arms/chest that women's fashion does. For men if they want to signal status they tend to buy a car they can't afford or something.

And male health is one of those areas where it is very complicated. A fat, balding man who smells funny can make up for that with a high income. A fat balding woman who smells funny might be able to do the same thing but I can't help feel sceptical at the idea.

Anyway, long story short, the people who aren't using fashion as signalling can just buy a shirt that fits and move on. It's a shirt. They aren't complicated.

[sfn42]

There's also the fact that most men aren't very healthy - you'll often see very fit men wearing "revealing" and tight-fitting clothes that show off their muscles etc, whereas everyone else wears less revealing clothes because whatever they may reveal isn't very flattering.

The same is true for most women of course but a lot of them seem to wear revealing clothing regardless of how flattering it actually is.

[wooger]

People with bad health, low status being able to wear the same clothes as young women with good health and status removes the signalling benefit of those clothes.

[Maxion]

> But wouldn't everyone want to signal good health and high status?

The thing with people is that they are all different. There are a lot of people who don't want to be of high status or signal it. There's lots of people who don't really care for health and value other things higher.

[karambahh]

Definition of "high status" vary by demographics.

Some want to carry X sportswear with prominent branding, others take pride in high-price tag items without any explicit branding.

The "I identify with this athlete", "I identify with this musician", "I dgaf what you think of me" groups probably don't intersect much, with brands and offering catering to these and multiple others...?

[necovek]

If you are in taller than 95% for men, and reasonably fit, you might need a bigger waistline (think 36 or more), which is still the same length for pants (up to 34) with your socks showing even when standing (depending on your individual proportions), but much wider around hips and legs than you need. I imagine for shorter men, it's the inverse but equally bad.

Some brands will carry slim and extra long trousers, but if I find a model that fits (not all models from the same brand do), I immediatelly buy a few. Otherwise, I try to get tailored stuff, but that's slow and annoying.

For shirts, it's even worse: unless you can find an extra long version, you are going to be wearing a sail and your underpants/ass will pop out when you sit down. But these are easier to get sewed for you as you can just have a single tailor make many of them as needed.

So it's probably easier for median men, but sizes scale exactly the same without regard to actual proportions for simply bigger people.

[dandellion]

> I imagine for shorter men, it's the inverse but equally bad.

Not really, as a quite short guy, many shops will offer me to have the clothes fitted, and if not it's pretty trivial to fit them myself. Maybe on the most extreme end of short it's more of an issue, but in general I suspect shortening pants and shirts is signficantly easier than lengthening them.

[abustamam]

I'm a 5'5", 110lbs man. I shop at the teens section and get larges. I may not get the trendiest looks, but I get cheaper clothes that fits and looks good on me!

I also tried Stitch Fix, they had a surprising amount of stuff that could fit me (both fashionably and size wise), albeit not as cheap as kids' clothes.

[dandellion]

I might grab something like sweatpants from kids section, but for normal clothes I generally prefer a bit more quality. I work remotely so a good pair of pants can last me more than half a decade, so I don't mind buying quality and having it fitted. But yeah, I feel as a short guy there's actually more than plenty of options for us, I never felt that clothes were an issue. Well, there was a shop once that put the smallest sizes on the highest shelf, I don't know if they thought it was funny, but I didn't go back.

[abustamam]

That's fair. I work remotely as well and to be honest I just cycle through the same two pants I got from Stitch Fix and a few collared shirts, and some concert merch for more casual outings.

I was speaking more to waistline — I have a 28 inch waist and the smallest I usually find is like 30 or more, so even a belt can't fix that.

[necovek]

Thanks both for the perspective: yeah, even if simply scaled down proportionally, you are left with too long garments that you can fold/shorten, so a much better situation than tall men who can end up looking like cartoon caricatures if dressed with widely available garments.

And don't get me wrong, tall girls (my sister is 6'1") have it even worse.

[Gigachad]

Its only a problem for online shopping. In store you can simply grab multiple sizes and see which one fits best. Many online stores try to give multiple measurements of the clothes but even then it's extremely difficult to predict how it will look on you.

Online shoppers seem to solve this issue by just buying multiple items and returning the ones that don't fit. After which the retailer throws these returns in the bin.

[echelon]

> if some women absolutely can't find something in their size from a specific brand, that makes the brand even more exclusive, like it being "for fit people only".

This is how many brands originally blow up and grow famous. Especially in Asia.

You make clothing in sizes only extremely slim people can wear.

This is an extremely popular brand that specifically does this, and it's hardly the only one:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandy_Melville

[Freak_NL]

Lululemon famously had that 'incident' where they flat out stated their brand just wasn't suitable for fat people. Given their brand identity this makes complete sense, whilst also excluding a large group of people. Expect more of this type of edgy marketing — it is in line with the zeitgeist (consider that eugenic jeans ad).

[genewitch]

this comment did it for me today on HN.

That commercial could have been any attractive woman without changing the tone or meaning. it just drives some people crazy that a subset of humans "controls" like half the land on earth but comprises only 7% of the population, therefore everything about or having to do with that subset or the individuals therein is automatically considered "bad."

There were commercials that had jingles "bust a nut, bust a nut, just open up a can and bust a nut. you can do it in the bathroom, you can do it in the kitchen, you can do it with your best friend [...]" nearly 30 years ago. Commercials are generally in poor taste, but some people read way too much into it.

[echelon]

It's the political zeitgeist. If it were the Biden years, I think it would have been interpreted differently.

One of the reasons why it blew up is the relative silence from American Eagle and Sydney Sweeney, both of whom took their sweet time to respond to the negative press. They were likely pressed to figure out how not to piss off either side of the electorate. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Their silence felt like affirmation of the accusation.

The follow up with other models from other races was good, but it came really slow. The damage was done by the time they figured it out.

[orbisvicis]

> you can get in any clothes store and get plenty of clothes to wear

"Getting into the clothes" is a low bar. I can get into this brown paper bag. Comfort is underrated.

> if some women absolutely can't find something in their size from a specific brand, that makes the brand even more exclusive, like it being "for fit people only".

Heh I think mens sizing signals the opposite: too skinny = insufficiently masculine.

[pprotas]

Women in my life often voice their frustration with badly fitting bras or pants. In reality, it really is a problem, but it's a problem everyone just accepts.

[webnrrd2k]

It's one of those "if we put a man on the moon, why can't we solve this damn thing" kind of problems.

Throughout my life I've had various girlfriends complain about poorly-fitting bras, especially ones with under-wires that bite or break. It really seems like it should be a solved problem, but I kinda don't think it is.

[sevenseacat]

In reality its a massive fucking problem. This is why so many women end up wearing men's clothing, which doesn't fit their shape at all, just because they're the only things they can find that they can actually fit into!

What special snowflake part of the world do you live in that any woman can walk into any clothes shop and find clothes that fit? Because I call bullshit on that.

[YetAnotherNick]

Not saying it isn't but the part that's hard to understand is why can't a new brand or a sub brand fix it? It seems almost trivial to label differently, and solve a problem worth solving for and earn money?

And no, don't tell me why existing brand doesn't do it, like all the other replies here.

[janalsncm]

Based on the article, several brands have clothes that range from the low 20s to the mid 50s which covers essentially all waist sizes. If a woman has a 55 inch waist or a 20 inch waist she cannot buy pants at American Eagle but I wouldn’t characterize it as a massive problem. In fact the article identifies exactly where such a woman could find pants.

[soulofmischief]

If you read the article, you've also seen that the proportions do not scale properly. Waste size is not the only important measurement, and as men it would behoove us to seek to understand this issue before going straight to dismissal.

[sevenseacat]

You realize clothes are more than just waist sizes? Pants, for example, need to account for waist, hips, thighs, and length. All of these are very very different ratios on women of different body shapes.

And what you've said actually confirms that what I said is accurate - women can't walk into _any_ clothes shop and find clothes that fit, which is what the poster I replied to said.

Plus, some of the data there is not consistent globally. I don't know a lot of the brands there, but Uniqlo is one we do have and they do not do 3XL in women's clothing here in Australia.

[Saline9515]

It's also linked to the modern trend of having tightly fitted clothing. You don't have this issue with skirts, or wider, pleated pants with a high waistline. Those clothes were the norm before the 60's, since it's much roomier and allows to fit a wide range of body types.

[throwaway2037]

    > It's also linked to the modern trend of having tightly fitted clothing.

Exactly this. If David Foster Wallace were still alive, ten years ago, he would have written an essay titled: "Everyone wears athleisure now."

[troupo]

> in reality it's not much of a problem. Billions of women manage to buy and wear clothes just fine

No. Billions of women don't have any other choice. Take your wife (or even better, mom) shopping for clothes. You'll learn a lot about "manage just fine". Often its a multi-hour slog through all stores trying to find just one item that doesn't look like shit, and fits somewhat well.

[throwaway2037]

I push back on this "it's only a woman problem". How is this any different for men? Re-read this post, but switch the gender. It seems unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

[disgruntledphd2]

Men are less curved (on average) than women, so this problem is worse for them.

It's still an issue for men though, I basically never buy clothes online as I don't trust the sizings and thus try everything on before I purchase.

[troupo]

"The grand scheme" consists of many such "small insignificant problems". And no one said it was only a woman problem. And I explicitly called out one of the arguments, not the "degender, men have similar problems etc."