Ghosts in The Attic

What brands do you associate with?

I used to think brands were really important. I grew up in a private school where your clothes were scrutinized just as much as the amount of money you had. I was never a popular kid, but I thought just maybe if I bought the brands they thought were cool, they’d like me more. Spoilers, it didn’t work.

As I got older I learned about Goodwill and would spend most of my adult life buying second hand goods. There’s just something awesome about all the cool things in one place. Because of this, I never really knew much about brands in the sense of buying them new, but maybe finding things that were rare or of value once in awhile.

I started working for a clothing company some years ago. At first, I loved them. The way they treated their employees, their mission statement, it was women run, one of the most diverse workforces, yada yada.

Over time, I bought more and more of their clothes, and they were a company with multiple brands so I owned lots of their things and can say I have easily helped facilitate the sale of hundreds of thousands of dollars of their merchandise. A couple of years ago we were told that we were being bought out. A great company, a group of sorts just going around and buying up retailers to collect them in their little group….

It took a few months of promises to realize that this company did not want any brand to succeed or that they even gave a shit about their customers. You don’t need to when you own most of the women’s clothing options.

They came in asking questions first, looking us over and how we operated, then went on to fire most of the staff of all brands that they owned in favor for outsourcing the labor to cheaper countries. Complaints abounded from customers that the quality of our customer service and of our clothing. Our programs were swapped out for different ones, they broke, overcharged, undercharged, couldn’t find inventory, pretty much anything that would prevent us from being a functional company was occurring. My job was to tell the correct department when things went wrong and to field complaints. Months of everything being broke, being screamed at, told I was useless, stupid, terrible at my job, every insult a disgruntled customer can muster. All while being told I wasn’t doing good enough with what I had been dealt by what little management we had left.

Inevitably I was fired, along with most people I cared about and I’m waiting to hear about the rest of the people who gave up their convictions to be stockholm syndromed by a company that can’t wait to fire them.

Yes I am still bitter about it but the moral of the story is, if you buy clothes from retailers, even ones that claim to be boutiques, with unique clothing and small scale artisanship. They are lying to you and do not give a shit about you, if you like your clothes, if they are made with quality materials, if they last more than one wear.

It’s really rare to find any company that is not one phone call away from selling you out and dumping their values for the highest bidder. Capitalism only cares about continual growth, not sustainable business practices, and certainly not quality over quantity.

If you can, buy local or buy secondhand. Research companies. Learn how to mend clothes. Demand better. We are being pushed to buy garbage quality clothes that will end up in the actual garbage for the next 10000 years. it’s a real shame it has to be this way but apparently clothing companies can’t be assed to knit well….