I can’t say much about bras, but as a former Buyer for a chain of high end bicycle shops, y’all are hard. We were focused on road bikes where everything down to the clothing fit is critical. I tried really hard to keep a good selection on hand, but even in the limited mostly ultra fit demographic, the size, cut, and fit range for women’s clothing is almost impossible to cover.
Women’s was a small segment for us. Most shops won’t carry much of anything. Indeed, we ran at a minimized loss margin to carry stuff. This is ultra niche specific and completely tangential, but it might help show a bit of behind the scenes retail. Carrying a large range of sizes, cuts, and styles of any clothing type is an overburden inventory nightmare. The issues are always the oddball extras that everyone gets stuck with and can’t offload anywhere near cost. All the time and labor of managing it is also an issue. The way women’s sections are always left in terrible shape is also a major contributing cost factor in overall stock costs. Having experienced life as a Buyer, the bra sections of most department stores look like break even inventory at best IMO.
Yeah, if there’s anything that history and economics tells us, is that capitalism leads to less choice, whereas communism leads to many choices tailored to everyone individually
If you see an Englishman in a kilt, it’s ok to say he’s no true Scotsman. See, “no true Scotsman” is only a problem if person/movement A IS actually fulfulling the functions of role B. And if you can read Marx and find a government that consistently tried to follow his writings, I’ll be very impressed and concede the point. (Though then we can talk about the difference between Marxism and other forms of socialism.)
See, logistics and capitalism don’t have to be tied together. A business at the end of the day needs money to stay in business. If people were willing to pay a bunch of extra money to have stuff that fits them right, it wouldn’t be so hard to keep it all in stock. It’s when you combine cheap prices, dozens of combinations of sizes and styles, customers that expect an employee will clean up their mess, and the need for immediate availability that things start to crumble.
It’s more that the wide variety of body shapes makes cheaply available, well-fitting clothes difficult. You can certainly have nice things in capitalism, you just have to have them custom made. The difficulties in making and widely distributing clothes that comfortably conform to the complex female firm are present in any economic model. The best comfortable solution is custom-made items, but that requires a great deal of time, labor, and resources.
I can’t say much about bras, but as a former Buyer for a chain of high end bicycle shops, y’all are hard. We were focused on road bikes where everything down to the clothing fit is critical. I tried really hard to keep a good selection on hand, but even in the limited mostly ultra fit demographic, the size, cut, and fit range for women’s clothing is almost impossible to cover.
Women’s was a small segment for us. Most shops won’t carry much of anything. Indeed, we ran at a minimized loss margin to carry stuff. This is ultra niche specific and completely tangential, but it might help show a bit of behind the scenes retail. Carrying a large range of sizes, cuts, and styles of any clothing type is an overburden inventory nightmare. The issues are always the oddball extras that everyone gets stuck with and can’t offload anywhere near cost. All the time and labor of managing it is also an issue. The way women’s sections are always left in terrible shape is also a major contributing cost factor in overall stock costs. Having experienced life as a Buyer, the bra sections of most department stores look like break even inventory at best IMO.
Basically what you’re saying is we can’t have nice things because capitalism.
I mean I’m not in the bra buying demographic but I can still understand that it’s an issue and it sucks for women.
Yeah, if there’s anything that history and economics tells us, is that capitalism leads to less choice, whereas communism leads to many choices tailored to everyone individually
I don’t think history has ever given us communism, so there’s no way to know.
Oh no, here comes the No True Scotsman again…
If you see an Englishman in a kilt, it’s ok to say he’s no true Scotsman. See, “no true Scotsman” is only a problem if person/movement A IS actually fulfulling the functions of role B. And if you can read Marx and find a government that consistently tried to follow his writings, I’ll be very impressed and concede the point. (Though then we can talk about the difference between Marxism and other forms of socialism.)
Yeah, communism leads to empty shelves in stores, so people are pleasantly surprised by any goods at all.
See, logistics and capitalism don’t have to be tied together. A business at the end of the day needs money to stay in business. If people were willing to pay a bunch of extra money to have stuff that fits them right, it wouldn’t be so hard to keep it all in stock. It’s when you combine cheap prices, dozens of combinations of sizes and styles, customers that expect an employee will clean up their mess, and the need for immediate availability that things start to crumble.
Bingo
I think it would still be an inventory nightmare to manage under socialism or communism.
The workers would produce their own bras.
It’s more that the wide variety of body shapes makes cheaply available, well-fitting clothes difficult. You can certainly have nice things in capitalism, you just have to have them custom made. The difficulties in making and widely distributing clothes that comfortably conform to the complex female firm are present in any economic model. The best comfortable solution is custom-made items, but that requires a great deal of time, labor, and resources.