White Hot: The Rise and Fall of Abercrombie & Fitch

[starlily]

It's on my list to watch. I worked at Abercrombie in 1994 as a college freshman and the discriminatory practices became obvious very quickly even to my 17-18yo self. They were opening their first store in SF when I got hired, so I had never heard of them prior.

I was unfortunately outside of the class for the lawsuit.

[al dente]

Apr 22, 2022 10:46:43 GMT -5 madringal said:

As an adult now, ugh, I can't even imagine wearing any of their clothes.

At the beginning of the pandemic I was on my phone entirely too much and started following a bunch of Instagram influencers. Abercrombie pushes hard in the 30ish year old influencer sphere. All at once everyone would have clothes from Abercrombie and I remember being like "huh? Grown adults wear Abercrombie?" So they are def marketing to the age group that grew up with Abercrombie vs the late teen/early 20s group which I thought was interesting.

Watching the doc I remembered my interview. It was a group interview and I don't think they asked any questions? Or super basic ones. I remember thinking it was a weird interview at the time, and now I see why!

[arehopsveggies]

Apr 23, 2022 4:01:31 GMT -5 al dente said:

Apr 22, 2022 10:46:43 GMT -5 madringal said:

As an adult now, ugh, I can't even imagine wearing any of their clothes.

At the beginning of the pandemic I was on my phone entirely too much and started following a bunch of Instagram influencers. Abercrombie pushes hard in the 30ish year old influencer sphere. All at once everyone would have clothes from Abercrombie and I remember being like "huh? Grown adults wear Abercrombie?" So they are def marketing to the age group that grew up with Abercrombie vs the late teen/early 20s group which I thought was interesting.

Watching the doc I remembered my interview. It was a group interview and I don't think they asked any questions? Or super basic ones. I remember thinking it was a weird interview at the time, and now I see why!

Someone gave my husband an Abercrombie shirt last year. Just a super plain basic t shirt. It was the only shirt he could tolerate when he had shingles though- it was so soft! I went to order more and couldn’t stomach the price so we just washed it every night for a week or two. He always laughs a little that he has his first Abercrombie shirt now at almost 40

[joy]

I’m 20 min into this doc and hating my 18 year old self. I hate that I let this company define what was cool, tell me that I wasn’t cool, made me aspire to be cool by wearing their clothes all while quietly realizing that I’d never fit their mold and thus always been inferior.

[goldengirlz]

Apr 23, 2022 14:02:13 GMT -5 joy said:

I’m 20 min into this doc and hating my 18 year old self. I hate that I let this company define what was cool, tell me that I wasn’t cool, made me aspire to be cool by wearing their clothes all while quietly realizing that I’d never fit their mold and thus always been inferior.

Don’t beat yourself up; the same was true for so many aspirational brands in the ‘90s. I know the ‘90s are back in a big way but there was SO MUCH that was problematic about that decade.

And that’s also why the late ‘90s/early ‘00s were filled with nihilistic, South Park watching dudes who hated “losers,” “jocks,” “posers,” etc. etc. Those guys were ALSO problematic but it was like living through two extremes. You were either thin and popular or burn-it-all-down.

[cville]

So, A&F has always been trash. I never bought their clothes, mainly because even as a relative youth the stores were too dark, smelly, and loud for me.

However, I thought the documentary was only OK. As in the quality of the production etc. It tried to do too much in the time so it had less depth than a Wikipedia article. Robin Givhan is one of my favorite writers and endlessly insightful about fashion snd marketing and business and they squander their interview with her.

[livinitup]

Who knew that capitalizing on an “All American” culture in the ‘90s meant excluding most of the culture?

Besides everyone.

I mean, I lived it. We all knew it. It’s just really weird seeing it all laid out in a documentary with court documents and evidence. And the testimony of people who were hurt by it.

[Jalapeñomel]

Apr 23, 2022 17:58:35 GMT -5 cville said:

So, A&F has always been trash. I never bought their clothes, mainly because even as a relative youth the stores were too dark, smelly, and loud for me.

However, I thought the documentary was only OK. As in the quality of the production etc. It tried to do too much in the time so it had less depth than a Wikipedia article. Robin Givhan is one of my favorite writers and endlessly insightful about fashion snd marketing and business and they squander their interview with her.

I’m with you. It wasn’t that engaging, and it seemed superficial.

[sent]

I just finished watching it. I actually had no idea about any of their problematic woes. I had stopped paying any attention to them after about 2001. I mean I knew they focused on skinny and good looking white people which wasn't me so I never shopped there again after my one shirt purchase. I totally related to the part about the problematic t-shirts being made. How the Asian guy described that the one Asian guy on the t-shirt committee wasn't about to stir the pot and say "hey, this kind of stereotyping is not cool to put on a t-shirt" in a room full of white people who aren't going to see or care about your ethnic point of view. That was very much my experience in HS and college in the 90s where I let offensive stuff slide because pointing it out would just lead to more mockery and not really a teachable moment. 

I also randomly know one of the people in the documentary. She didn't work there. I think she has written about them as part of her career.

[Cappy]

I watched this weekend. A lot of it was spot on. Especially what a creepy micromanager Mike Jeffries was. We all lived in fear of him and knew he was unhinged. But other stuff in the documentary just didn't represent what I saw happen in our (Midwest) store, or was stuff I wish they'd dug into further bc there was way more to it. We were required to do interviews every week, regardless of if we were hiring. Every time someone asked about work we told them come back at 5pm on Monday and then the managers had to do this dumb group interview where we asked questions and everyone went in a circle to answer. No one was ever hired from it unless it was holidays or back to school where we'd have more labor hours. We always thought it was a waste of our time as busy managers. Now I wonder if that was some kind of scheme to make working there seem "exclusive". Like if we reject 20 people/week then is it going to perpetuate the aura of no one being "good enough"?

[shortstax]

I watched over the weekend. Anyone else think they did the VP of DEI dirty? I felt like they implied that he didn’t make meaningful change—but really, what can 1 person realistically do in a top-down culture that was so extreme?

There were too many edited shots of him not energetically answering inquiries—but like, how can he? That had to be such a tough position to be in.

[midwestmama]

A&F was really big when I was in HS and college. I didn't have enough money to shop there and I certainly didn't fit their image. One of my college suitemates worked there, she fit the image - size 0, blonde hair, tan, pretty. I wasn't super close with her, so I never really asked details about working there. I might check out the documentary because I certainly had an opinion about A&F back then.

[midwestmama]

Apr 22, 2022 10:46:43 GMT -5 madringal said:

As an adult now, ugh, I can't even imagine wearing any of their clothes. But I will say their kids stuff has the best sizing for tall, slim kids. No one else has 9/10, 11/12, 13/14, 15/16. It all goes from 8 to 10/12, to 14/16. It's been a lifesaver for us. And shockingly, the clothes are pretty modest.

+1 to this.  When my DD was in between sizes elsewhere, I was able to get some things from A&F Kids that fit her.  (Although I had an internal battle about buying from there - remembering the inferiority complex I felt every time I walked past the store when I was at the mall when I was HS and college-age.)  

[pixy0stix]

My roommate dated one of the "models" that stood shirtless by the front of the door. He was... not the brightest bulb. That's about all the experience I have with Abercrombie.

[goldengirlz]

Apr 25, 2022 11:04:24 GMT -5 shortstax said:

I watched over the weekend. Anyone else think they did the VP of DEI dirty? I felt like they implied that he didn’t make meaningful change—but really, what can 1 person realistically do in a top-down culture that was so extreme?

There were too many edited shots of him not energetically answering inquiries—but like, how can he? That had to be such a tough position to be in.

I actually thought he had good answers and came across sympathetically — like he acknowledged that it was a difficult undertaking and that he was probably hired for window-dressing-type reasons. But the alternative was to not try to help at all.

I also think this is a common challenge in the DEI world where people are set up to fail because they don’t have leadership support. Most people (understandably) would run screaming from that situation, but there are some who say, But if I could make even a small difference to the employees there …

Very tough position.

[jaylea]

I interviewed there in the late 90s/early 2000s because my friend worked there and fully loved the experience.

I was so grossed out by the interview (so much talk about looking cute and what to wear etc that even at 19 or so I was like “is this for real?”) that I didn’t take the job.

Everyone there knew you had to have a look and wore it as a badge of honor. So gross.

I bet I’d have been in the stockroom, lol.

[nsl]

I just finished this, and wow the ending was really bad. Like, expose-turned-puff-piece bad. “Here’s a brand that did a lot of harm for a long time, but now they’re hiring plus-size non-white models so it’s all better” bad. No context for the current CEO, who she is, what is fundamentally different about her philosophy than previous leadership, just plonking down this person and running footage of models and clothes the previous CEO would never have hired. That’s the kind of superficial “diversity” the doc itself pointed out as a massive problem less than 10 minutes earlier when recounting the lawsuit that wound up at the Supreme Court.

Also, the green screens were really terrible. Distractingly terrible. How much more could it possibly have cost the production to film people in those actual rooms?

[Cappy]

Apr 25, 2022 22:39:14 GMT -5 nsl said:

I just finished this, and wow the ending was really bad. Like, expose-turned-puff-piece bad. “Here’s a brand that did a lot of harm for a long time, but now they’re hiring plus-size non-white models so it’s all better” bad. No context for the current CEO, who she is, what is fundamentally different about her philosophy than previous leadership, just plonking down this person and running footage of models and clothes the previous CEO would never have hired. That’s the kind of superficial “diversity” the doc itself pointed out as a massive problem less than 10 minutes earlier when recounting the lawsuit that wound up at the Supreme Court.

Also, the green screens were really terrible. Distractingly terrible. How much more could it possibly have cost the production to film people in those actual rooms?

This sounds so conspiratorial of me but I almost wonder if A&F was in on it. One of the things I remember was how they bragged about not paying for advertising. They even charged for the catalog. Jeffries was very much of the opinion that all PR is positive-- even when it's not. So any time they'd have a controversy covered (the catalog nudity, those horrible kid thongs, etc.) it was NBD. I would not at all be surprised to learn if they are loving this documentary. Everyone is talking about the company these days vs. asking if they are still around. 

[Deleted]

Apr 22, 2022 8:05:12 GMT -5 hermione said:

I watched this last night and...wow! I was too intimidated to shop there - it was very clear it was a store for pretty/thin people. I didn't consider myself either. Plus the I just generally found the inability to look through the windows to see what was inside off-putting.

In addition to the hiring/firing practices, the part in the documentary where they showed the racist graphic tees was really horrifying.

The tees were so horrific.

[Birdie]

Apr 21, 2022 10:58:16 GMT -5 purplepenguin7 said:

Apr 21, 2022 9:06:49 GMT -5 Cappy said:

Re: Hiring. I don't know if it is touched on in the documentary or not (I'll watch this weekend and circle back) but everyone assumes hiring practice was just based on good looks when the corporate metric was linked to something crazy called "target school". Each store was assigned a local college (or, for Hollister, a high school) and we had targets to meet for hires. 75% of my hires were supposed to be from the target college and I got dinged if they weren't. By doing things this way, A&F was hitching themselves to the exclusionary gatekeeping provided by the university's own admissions process (SES/race/etc.). I have no idea whether it was intentional or not but it would not surprise me at all if that was intentional.

The idea pushed from home office was that if you hired all these students from a specific college then they'd have to buy the clothes for work and wear them on campus. They'd then start to influence the culture of the campus as "brand reps". I guess kind of like early day Instagram influencers.

These brand reps could only work if they were "current", meaning their clothes were sold on a current "floor set" and not on clearance. There were rules on how many layers you had to wear. Just a t-shirt wasn't allowed. It had to be at least 2 layered shirts. As soon as something went on sale you could no longer wear it. This all meant employees were required to keep buying more and more expensive clothes at only 20% discount to have the chance to work. They required us to hire hundreds of people but then only gave us the labor to schedule a few brand reps 5-10 hours/week. I always felt like the clothing and target school strategy gave off major MLM vibes because all of these employees were a secondary target market for sales.

A friend of mine was told she had take off her belt because it wasn't from the current season.  I also knew a few other people who worked there and were sent home on occasion due to not wearing the "right" outfit to work.  I worked in retail (express) at the time and the Express vs. A&F culture was worlds apart.  I remember we just had to wear "express like" clothes at one point. 

Same with American Eagle. I didn't have to wear specific AE clothing, although I often times did. I was a cute, skinny college girl but I wouldn't have been hired on at A&F. By the time I worked at AE I was done dealing with that BS.

[msmerymac]

Apr 22, 2022 10:46:43 GMT -5 madringal said:

I was for sure more of a Gap girl in HS (Legit, my AOL screen name was GapGirl165, lol) and we didn't have A&F anywhere near me. But twice a year our youth group would make a trip to Indy and our first stop was ALWAYS A&F at Circle Center Mall. Coming back to small town, Indiana in my new A&F gear was a high like none other.

As an adult now, ugh, I can't even imagine wearing any of their clothes. But I will say their kids stuff has the best sizing for tall, slim kids. No one else has 9/10, 11/12, 13/14, 15/16. It all goes from 8 to 10/12, to 14/16. It's been a lifesaver for us. And shockingly, the clothes are pretty modest.

Ha! I thought the Gap was too preppy when I was in high school. I once had a friend describe my style as "a little more funky" and I don't think it was a compliment (SHE was very into the Gap), but I took it as such. 

[madringal]

Apr 27, 2022 10:25:38 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

Apr 22, 2022 10:46:43 GMT -5 madringal said:

I was for sure more of a Gap girl in HS (Legit, my AOL screen name was GapGirl165, lol) and we didn't have A&F anywhere near me. But twice a year our youth group would make a trip to Indy and our first stop was ALWAYS A&F at Circle Center Mall. Coming back to small town, Indiana in my new A&F gear was a high like none other.

As an adult now, ugh, I can't even imagine wearing any of their clothes. But I will say their kids stuff has the best sizing for tall, slim kids. No one else has 9/10, 11/12, 13/14, 15/16. It all goes from 8 to 10/12, to 14/16. It's been a lifesaver for us. And shockingly, the clothes are pretty modest.

Ha! I thought the Gap was too preppy when I was in high school. I once had a friend describe my style as "a little more funky" and I don't think it was a compliment (SHE was very into the Gap), but I took it as such. 

I got my “funky” clothes from Delia’s. Was there anything better than getting a Delia’s catalog?

[pinkyp]

Oh yeah I'll be interested to watch this. I remember thinking it was so funny to see stacks of the A&F Quarterly (with all the nudity) in the mail room at my uptight college right there next to the J. Crew catalog.

[Pilsy]

My college humor magazine published a great spoof of the A&F catalog. I laughed out loud at that thing; I think it's still in a box in my childhood bedroom!

That's all I have to contribute here.

[basilosaurus]

Apr 27, 2022 10:43:30 GMT -5 madringal said:

Apr 27, 2022 10:25:38 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

Ha! I thought the Gap was too preppy when I was in high school. I once had a friend describe my style as "a little more funky" and I don't think it was a compliment (SHE was very into the Gap), but I took it as such. 

I got my “funky” clothes from Delia’s. Was there anything better than getting a Delia’s catalog?

I never received one. Someone at camp introduced me, and I was so proud that I knew what it was when it started circulating around school like it was some girlie mag, although we didn't have to pass them covertly. The prestige was the same. My only access to similar was the occasional trip to 579. Wet seal was a rare treat.