[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]Offers you can't refuse[/font]
[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]In the last of an occasional series on modern shopping, Linda Grant finds that New York retailers are the world experts at parting people from their money. (And she's got three coats, a skirt, two handbags, four pairs of trousers and seven tops to prove it)[/font]
[font=Geneva,Arial,sans-serif]Thursday March 31, 2005
The Guardian
[/font][font=Geneva,Arial,sans-serif]'Hi, my name's Monica, you look to me like you need some help." "I can't find any jeans that fit." "What are you trying on?" "I've tried on everything."
"All the styles?"
"No, just the classic fit."
"Why you tryin' the classic fit?"
"Because it says on the label that they're cut for wider hips."
"You don't need classic cut." "Why not? My hips are my widest part."
"You hold on there, I know what you need, I'll go get you something."
Monica goes away and I hang around the Gap, looking at the piles of jeans. After a while she comes back and takes me to a changing room. On the wall is a row of jeans, hung from their belt loops on a row of hooks. "On each hook there's two pairs of jeans," she says, "in two sizes. The one on top should fit you best and the cut should fit you best from left to right, so the top pair of jeans on the left should be your best fit and the bottom pair on the right should be the worst fit. You go try on jeans."
The top pair on the left are a perfect fit. I have long legs and slim thighs and no hips. "What are these?" I say, twisting round to try to see the label.
"I figured you were best in modern fit, but one size up to allow for the hips. I was right."
"Yes, you were, but how did you know that?"
"I could tell just by looking at you. You want those jeans?"
"I certainly do. Can you find me a pair of plain black pants now?"
"I certainly can."
I leave with two pairs of jeans and two pairs of black pants. "You got a Gap card?" she asks when I pay. "No? That's a real shame because you would get another 10% off the price." I wish I had a Gap card.
This is America. This is the land where the irritating sales assistants constantly following you around asking, "Can I help you?" actually want to help you and know what help you want even when you don't yourself. It is a vast paradigm shift to say, "Yes, please open up a changing room for me. Please follow me around and take everything I pick up from the rail and put it in the changing room, so when I'm ready to start trying on, it will all be there waiting for me. Please find me a top to go with this skirt. What shoes would match this coat? Do you have any earrings that bring out the colour of this scarf that you have matched to the bag that goes with the coat?"
We think we live in the time of corporate globalisation. We think we are MacShopped, but we are not. The Gap Corporation Inc, which we believe to be a global brand, has stores in only three other countries outside the US: Britain, Canada and Japan. One of its other brands, Banana Republic, extends only across the border to Canada. Everyone I know in America buys their clothes at Banana Republic. If there isn't a store near you, you can buy the whole collection online. Its sizes extend to fit the needle-thin women of the Upper East Side and the more roomy rear ends of the Dairy States. They do not ship abroad, in case you're wondering.
In Britain we don't know the first thing about American retail. Few of their chains have successfully crossed the Atlantic and fewer still have even tried. Both sales staff and shoppers would have to unlearn their life's experience. You have to be educated in how to shop in America, it's no use just getting off the plane for the great two-for-one sale, $2 to the pound. The function of American retail is to get you to part with your money, and this is not a passive exercise on the part of the retailers. They have ways of making you spend.
I am in Bloomingdales handbag department. I see a green suede Dolce & Gabbana bag which is 30% off. I have never in my life wanted a bag so much but it is very small, I cannot get my wallet, keys, Palm Pilot, mobile phone and a book into it. "It's fabulous, but too small," I tell the sales assistant. "Why don't you buy another bag that's the right size for you and if you purchase this sale item, I can give you another 20% off any full-price bag. Have you looked at the new line from Coach?" So that's it, I buy two handbags. They have seen me coming, but what the hell am I supposed to do? Two fabulous handbags for the price of one in London.
Now we are in Banana Republic's flagship store on Fifth Avenue. My best purchase of the past 12 months anywhere is a silver satin, box-pleated skirt from Banana Republic, which, worn with a black sweater, looks like a combination put together in a back room at Prada. But stop right there, before you spend. You have to understand how the place works. Nothing in the store stays full price for longer than six weeks. Unless you have to have it now, you can get it for 70% off if you wait till next month. And when I say it goes on sale, I mean that it will go on sale in all the sizes. If they don't have it in store, they'll call around to find a store that does have it and ship it straight to your home. Free, obviously.
The night before, I had dinner with some New Yorkers and one of them, Chris Colletti, who works in marketing, said it had to be the best assignment in the world to review Banana Republic; he got lots of stuff there himself, so I asked him to come and help me look at the menswear. "Banana Republic is for guys from their 20s to their late 50s," Chris said, as we wandered round the basement where heterosexual men were confidently trying on leather jackets. "It's for the person who has left college and is starting their first real job and who needs a suit, and the older man who wants fashionable casual wear. It's very obvious that for the past couple of seasons they've been influenced by British style, Ted Baker. Now look what they're doing here."
He points out a rack of jackets. "See how they have the shirts that go with the jackets right across from them, so when you turn round you see them straight away? And look at this rack of pants, in four different colours. When a man finds a pair of pants he likes, he wants to buy a few pairs, exactly the same. A guy comes in here who is uncertain about how to dress, who doesn't know how to put it all together, the store does all that for him. Everything is next to each other so you don't have to go to the shirt section, then the tie section. And if you need some help, the sales assistant will go get everything for you. They'll make up a whole look for work or for the weekend."
I had to go to Barney's. It is to New York what Harvey Nichols is to London, the high-end fashion store. If you love clothes, then walking around Barney's is a treat. I saw this in Vogue. I saw that on some 6ft teenager from Estonia raising her platform-shod feet like a colt along the catwalk. And here it actually is, on a hanger, with a price tag, and I could actually try it on, except, of course, I never could afford it so what's the point? But the assistant wants you to try it on. She knows you can't afford it, but so what? It doesn't matter to her. Because in America, you may be poor today, but tomorrow there will be a stock market boom or you will get a huge promotion, or you'll invent Google, or you'll marry Donald Trump, and then you will remember the fabulous Galliano gown you tried on in Barney's and you'll be back.
So I see this coat. And this coat looks at me and winks. Then jumps on to my back. And, of course, it is on sale, reduced from $995 to $359, because this is New York and it is an impatient city and no one can be expected to wait until the *** end of the summer to get a bargain. And I buy the coat. In fact I come home from America with three coats, a skirt, two pairs of jeans, two pairs of black pants, seven tops, a pair of shoes, two handbags, gloves, scarves and an addiction to walk-in Vietnamese manicure salons, unfulfillable in London. I walk into Zara on Regent Street and the sales staff are far, far away, somewhere in the Andromeda Nebula, dreaming their own dreams. If you shout very loud you can wake them up, and say, "I saw a maroon wrap dress in the Zara in New York. Where do you have it in the store? "A what? A wop dress? Mowoon?" Because here in Britain we do not really have the hang of consumer capitalism. "Do you have it in my size?" we ask, forlornly, knowing the reply is, "Only what you see on the rail." "Do you have it in my size?" we ask in America. And the answer to everything, because this is America, is always the crowd-pleasing, money-making, consumer capitalism-fuelling, "Yes!"
[/font]
[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]In the last of an occasional series on modern shopping, Linda Grant finds that New York retailers are the world experts at parting people from their money. (And she's got three coats, a skirt, two handbags, four pairs of trousers and seven tops to prove it)[/font]
[font=Geneva,Arial,sans-serif]Thursday March 31, 2005
The Guardian
[/font][font=Geneva,Arial,sans-serif]'Hi, my name's Monica, you look to me like you need some help." "I can't find any jeans that fit." "What are you trying on?" "I've tried on everything."
"All the styles?"
"No, just the classic fit."
"Why you tryin' the classic fit?"
"Because it says on the label that they're cut for wider hips."
"You don't need classic cut." "Why not? My hips are my widest part."
"You hold on there, I know what you need, I'll go get you something."
Monica goes away and I hang around the Gap, looking at the piles of jeans. After a while she comes back and takes me to a changing room. On the wall is a row of jeans, hung from their belt loops on a row of hooks. "On each hook there's two pairs of jeans," she says, "in two sizes. The one on top should fit you best and the cut should fit you best from left to right, so the top pair of jeans on the left should be your best fit and the bottom pair on the right should be the worst fit. You go try on jeans."
The top pair on the left are a perfect fit. I have long legs and slim thighs and no hips. "What are these?" I say, twisting round to try to see the label.
"I figured you were best in modern fit, but one size up to allow for the hips. I was right."
"Yes, you were, but how did you know that?"
"I could tell just by looking at you. You want those jeans?"
"I certainly do. Can you find me a pair of plain black pants now?"
"I certainly can."
I leave with two pairs of jeans and two pairs of black pants. "You got a Gap card?" she asks when I pay. "No? That's a real shame because you would get another 10% off the price." I wish I had a Gap card.
This is America. This is the land where the irritating sales assistants constantly following you around asking, "Can I help you?" actually want to help you and know what help you want even when you don't yourself. It is a vast paradigm shift to say, "Yes, please open up a changing room for me. Please follow me around and take everything I pick up from the rail and put it in the changing room, so when I'm ready to start trying on, it will all be there waiting for me. Please find me a top to go with this skirt. What shoes would match this coat? Do you have any earrings that bring out the colour of this scarf that you have matched to the bag that goes with the coat?"
We think we live in the time of corporate globalisation. We think we are MacShopped, but we are not. The Gap Corporation Inc, which we believe to be a global brand, has stores in only three other countries outside the US: Britain, Canada and Japan. One of its other brands, Banana Republic, extends only across the border to Canada. Everyone I know in America buys their clothes at Banana Republic. If there isn't a store near you, you can buy the whole collection online. Its sizes extend to fit the needle-thin women of the Upper East Side and the more roomy rear ends of the Dairy States. They do not ship abroad, in case you're wondering.
In Britain we don't know the first thing about American retail. Few of their chains have successfully crossed the Atlantic and fewer still have even tried. Both sales staff and shoppers would have to unlearn their life's experience. You have to be educated in how to shop in America, it's no use just getting off the plane for the great two-for-one sale, $2 to the pound. The function of American retail is to get you to part with your money, and this is not a passive exercise on the part of the retailers. They have ways of making you spend.
I am in Bloomingdales handbag department. I see a green suede Dolce & Gabbana bag which is 30% off. I have never in my life wanted a bag so much but it is very small, I cannot get my wallet, keys, Palm Pilot, mobile phone and a book into it. "It's fabulous, but too small," I tell the sales assistant. "Why don't you buy another bag that's the right size for you and if you purchase this sale item, I can give you another 20% off any full-price bag. Have you looked at the new line from Coach?" So that's it, I buy two handbags. They have seen me coming, but what the hell am I supposed to do? Two fabulous handbags for the price of one in London.
Now we are in Banana Republic's flagship store on Fifth Avenue. My best purchase of the past 12 months anywhere is a silver satin, box-pleated skirt from Banana Republic, which, worn with a black sweater, looks like a combination put together in a back room at Prada. But stop right there, before you spend. You have to understand how the place works. Nothing in the store stays full price for longer than six weeks. Unless you have to have it now, you can get it for 70% off if you wait till next month. And when I say it goes on sale, I mean that it will go on sale in all the sizes. If they don't have it in store, they'll call around to find a store that does have it and ship it straight to your home. Free, obviously.
The night before, I had dinner with some New Yorkers and one of them, Chris Colletti, who works in marketing, said it had to be the best assignment in the world to review Banana Republic; he got lots of stuff there himself, so I asked him to come and help me look at the menswear. "Banana Republic is for guys from their 20s to their late 50s," Chris said, as we wandered round the basement where heterosexual men were confidently trying on leather jackets. "It's for the person who has left college and is starting their first real job and who needs a suit, and the older man who wants fashionable casual wear. It's very obvious that for the past couple of seasons they've been influenced by British style, Ted Baker. Now look what they're doing here."
He points out a rack of jackets. "See how they have the shirts that go with the jackets right across from them, so when you turn round you see them straight away? And look at this rack of pants, in four different colours. When a man finds a pair of pants he likes, he wants to buy a few pairs, exactly the same. A guy comes in here who is uncertain about how to dress, who doesn't know how to put it all together, the store does all that for him. Everything is next to each other so you don't have to go to the shirt section, then the tie section. And if you need some help, the sales assistant will go get everything for you. They'll make up a whole look for work or for the weekend."
I had to go to Barney's. It is to New York what Harvey Nichols is to London, the high-end fashion store. If you love clothes, then walking around Barney's is a treat. I saw this in Vogue. I saw that on some 6ft teenager from Estonia raising her platform-shod feet like a colt along the catwalk. And here it actually is, on a hanger, with a price tag, and I could actually try it on, except, of course, I never could afford it so what's the point? But the assistant wants you to try it on. She knows you can't afford it, but so what? It doesn't matter to her. Because in America, you may be poor today, but tomorrow there will be a stock market boom or you will get a huge promotion, or you'll invent Google, or you'll marry Donald Trump, and then you will remember the fabulous Galliano gown you tried on in Barney's and you'll be back.
So I see this coat. And this coat looks at me and winks. Then jumps on to my back. And, of course, it is on sale, reduced from $995 to $359, because this is New York and it is an impatient city and no one can be expected to wait until the *** end of the summer to get a bargain. And I buy the coat. In fact I come home from America with three coats, a skirt, two pairs of jeans, two pairs of black pants, seven tops, a pair of shoes, two handbags, gloves, scarves and an addiction to walk-in Vietnamese manicure salons, unfulfillable in London. I walk into Zara on Regent Street and the sales staff are far, far away, somewhere in the Andromeda Nebula, dreaming their own dreams. If you shout very loud you can wake them up, and say, "I saw a maroon wrap dress in the Zara in New York. Where do you have it in the store? "A what? A wop dress? Mowoon?" Because here in Britain we do not really have the hang of consumer capitalism. "Do you have it in my size?" we ask, forlornly, knowing the reply is, "Only what you see on the rail." "Do you have it in my size?" we ask in America. And the answer to everything, because this is America, is always the crowd-pleasing, money-making, consumer capitalism-fuelling, "Yes!"
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