Triple size this

Size 000 at J. Crew. I wondered what the fuss was. A lot of head and media space has been taken up with the kerfuffle about size triple zero. Seemed like someone was making a molehill out of a mountain, or vice versa. As you know—or maybe you didn’t know—I’m no retail clothing expert, but I figured there must be a market for a less-than-nothing size. Why would any retailer with any sense at all stock a size that isn’t going to sell in the North American market? Am I right? I am. My ethnicity is Italian, Irish and Albanian. We are, generally speaking, robust people. We take up space. My brothers make those annoying, beeping, back-up sounds when I back up. My family jokes about not wearing white pants because someone will show a movie on our backside if we do.

Go on. You’re nodding your head and laughing. But I’m an ordinary person and I know if there’s a need, someone’s going to create a product to fill it—size-wise or otherwise. So what’s happening to those of us who take up a bit of space? Well, it seems the retail clothing display racks can only handle so many size selections at one time. When the size choices start at triple zero at one end of the rack, it stands to reason the other end will likely max out at size 10. Geez.

On a recent shopping trip, I found my new clothing peeve isn’t about the triple zero stuff (into which my left arm wouldn’t fit). It’s about what is now happening at the other end of the size range. The burr under my saddle is that if the human-sized clothing, doesn’t fit on the display racks, anymore, where the heck does it go? As a person who worked hard for almost four years to get rid of most of my flab and get fit, I thought for sure I’d no longer find myself flipping through the plus size racks and shopping in stores which specialize in clothing for larger women. Well, great big silly me. On my recent excursion to find a pair of jeans (my current selection of jeans makes me look like a droopy-arsed rapper), I was told, “This style only goes to size ten. Selections for larger women are over there. They are cut curvier, if you know what I mean.”

I knew what she meant because her voice said “curvier” but her face said “bigger”. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate my curves, I know what the retail “curvier,” means. Visions of Rubenesque women wearing grubby pyjama pants, lounging on saggy lawn furniture, eating potato chips, drinking Beer-ritas and licking Kit Kat bars danced in my head.

I want to know when the H E double zeros (and more) did a size 12 become the larger, curvier size? Maybe there is something more going on with this 000 clothing size movement than meets the eye. Could it be someone forgot to tell clothing retailers the average North America woman admits to wearing sizes between 12 and 16 and has a waist size of 37 inches? I’m not making that up. That’s just the way it is.

I don’t think clothing manufacturers and retailers are unaware of what size the average woman wears. So maybe there is something subversive related to this movement. Maybe retailers want to make women feel fat by stocking the shelves with triple zeros. I just haven’t quite figured out how this wee-sizing pays off for retailers, unless they’re in cahoots with the Slim- Band people. It’s a surgical conspiracy.

Who knows. the next marketing trick could be a BOGO—buy one, get one Slimband. Yeah, that’s the ticket.

theresa@wellingtontimes.ca