Tailored clothing sales still sagging
Reports of the return to more formal
dressing may be exaggerated.
Despite anecdotal accounts of companies
tightening the reins on casual wear at the office, apparel
sales figures don’t indicate that people are rushing out
to bring their wardrobes up to new dress codes. Sales of
tailored apparel were off 14 percent in 2002 from the previous
year, according to the American Apparel and Footwear Association, and continued their decline in the first half
of 2003, down more than 16 percent from the same six-month
period of the previous year.
Overall apparel sales have been down
during the same period, but not by nearly as much as tailored
apparel. For 2002, total sales were off 1.7 percent from 2001;
for the first six months of this year, they were down 7.6
percent from the first six months of 2002.
According to the AAFA market survey, about
$13 out of every $100 that Americans spend on apparel goes to
the tailored clothing category. Last year that amounted to
about $22.5 billion out of a total of $174 billion spent on
clothing.
As might be expected, women outspend men
about two to one, but men’s underwear is one of only two
categories that is showing a double-digit percentage increase
so far this year. The other is outerwear. Tailored clothing is
the only one of the 11 categories showing a double-digit
decline this year.
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