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The department stores have the same sort of death spiral as malls - the quality drops, people stop going in, the quality drops again. I’ve never in my life fel
by taurath 7y ago
The department stores have the same sort of death spiral as malls - the quality drops, people stop going in, the quality drops again.
I’ve never in my life felt going to a department store I’d be met by someone knowledgeable in an area other than makeup.
One thing I’d have loved to see - an emphasis on customization and tailoring. Almost everyone could use a little custom tailoring for pants, blouses and shirts, and it does not scale online well at all as you need to be in person to get measured. If you like a shirt and it’s ill fitting, pay $15/20 for a cheap hem job and walk out feeling like a million bucks.
- mncharity 7y ago> One thing I’d have loved to see - an emphasis on customization and tailoring. [...] for pants [...] That was a startup two decades back. Built on automated pattern cutting. MVP was customized khakis. You'd enter detailed measurements on a website; machine-cut parts were assembled "manually" the next-ish day; then FedEx. Had a little tag with a number, so you could order "just like N, but let out a 1/2 inch". It was nifty. It was acquired by Levis, which mismanaged it into nonexistence. Last-ish factory in the US providing that assembly closed, plus the patent, and that was the end of that. IIRC. Perhaps in China? Years back, if you needed a new wardrobe of suits, it was worth a trip to HK just for that.
- mywittyname 7y agoDo you really benefit much from having robots do the cutting? I suspect most of the skill and costs are in the assembly. Modern Tailor offers MtM clothing starting at like $50.
- mncharity 7y agoIt's mass-production sewing, just with non-uniform stock. The customized pattern cutting provides the customized fit. Instead of boxes full of identically-cut pieces to be assembled, there's a packet with someone's customized pieces. Which is why the US getting out of mass-production apparel manufacturing was a problem. Perhaps this was a niche in which US apparel manufacturing might have remained viable, with customization and shipping proximity supporting the extra US costs. It seems regrettable that the possibility wasn't better explored.
- mywittyname 7y ago> I’ve never in my life felt going to a department store I’d be met by someone knowledgeable in an area other than makeup. Coincidentally, this is likely the highest margin department in the store.
- bobthepanda 7y agoI don't know if they still do this, but Uniqlo offered in store tailoring for their jeans when I went to one of their massive NYC stores years ago.