One Size Cannot Fit Most As a self-confessed shopaholic, I don 't avoid many stores, but there is one store specifically I cannot bring myself to walk into. For a multitude of reasons, I chose not to shop at Brandy Melville because of its ridiculous idea that one size fits most. Walking into a Brandy Melville store, you will not see a size bigger than a small or a one size label scattered across hangers of clothing that looks incredibly similar to one another. It doesn’t take a genius to see who exactly Brandy Melville is selling to, take one look at their Instagram and you 'll find her: white, blonde, skinny, long-legged girls who look exactly the same. Teenage girls are most attracted to this brand because of its popularity, the sense of
…show more content…
Their dream body is that of Romee Strijd, Melville’s latest model. Standing tall at five feet ten inches, Strijd is a Brandy girl and a Victoria 's Secret model (because why not drive the unattainable standard into overdrive), she fits into the clothes measuring 24 inches at the waist. While most teen girls are on average 30 inches in the waist (Rubin), Strijd and other models are the picture of perfection. The same picture of perfection in fact, there are only ever white girls. Even though some aren’t really California girls, they fit the brand’s idea of one and are able to shimmy into their clothes. Other than the exclusion of other sizes, this brand also excludes different ethnicities as mentioned before. In an open letter to Brandy Melville, teen Lai Renaldo criticized the company and the notion that most teen girls are able to wear a one size or small size and the lack of diversity, writing “none of the shirts fit over your chest, or you couldn 't squeeze your curves into the tiny-sized jean shorts, that quite frankly never cover your rear end,” and “not EVERY single girl in California is represented in this look.” The lack of representation in the company not only crushes teen girl who can’t fit into their clothes, but also the girls who aren’t of the ethnicity Brandy Melville caters …show more content…
They specifically have signs with “one size fits most” sprawled in their stores and purposefully use Caucasian teen girls to create marketing strategies. According to Racked, the brand employs over twenty girls as their marketing team, where they “brainstorm new concepts and consult on existing ones.” (Rubin) Most girls were previously fans of the brand and moonlight as the brand’s models, as they are given the clothes and asked to stage photoshoots with them. Then the brand takes these photos and post them across Instagram and Twitter. The people deciding what goes in the store are the models basically, and the only models they employ are white Caucasian and blonde. Brandy Melville knows what they are doing and sees the backlash across various platforms. They could do something about that and change their sizes to include sizes bigger than a two and hire ethnically diverse models, but they choose not
Their dream body is that of Romee Strijd, Melville’s latest model. Standing tall at five feet ten inches, Strijd is a Brandy girl and a Victoria 's Secret model (because why not drive the unattainable standard into overdrive), she fits into the clothes measuring 24 inches at the waist. While most teen girls are on average 30 inches in the waist (Rubin), Strijd and other models are the picture of perfection. The same picture of perfection in fact, there are only ever white girls. Even though some aren’t really California girls, they fit the brand’s idea of one and are able to shimmy into their clothes. Other than the exclusion of other sizes, this brand also excludes different ethnicities as mentioned before. In an open letter to Brandy Melville, teen Lai Renaldo criticized the company and the notion that most teen girls are able to wear a one size or small size and the lack of diversity, writing “none of the shirts fit over your chest, or you couldn 't squeeze your curves into the tiny-sized jean shorts, that quite frankly never cover your rear end,” and “not EVERY single girl in California is represented in this look.” The lack of representation in the company not only crushes teen girl who can’t fit into their clothes, but also the girls who aren’t of the ethnicity Brandy Melville caters …show more content…
They specifically have signs with “one size fits most” sprawled in their stores and purposefully use Caucasian teen girls to create marketing strategies. According to Racked, the brand employs over twenty girls as their marketing team, where they “brainstorm new concepts and consult on existing ones.” (Rubin) Most girls were previously fans of the brand and moonlight as the brand’s models, as they are given the clothes and asked to stage photoshoots with them. Then the brand takes these photos and post them across Instagram and Twitter. The people deciding what goes in the store are the models basically, and the only models they employ are white Caucasian and blonde. Brandy Melville knows what they are doing and sees the backlash across various platforms. They could do something about that and change their sizes to include sizes bigger than a two and hire ethnically diverse models, but they choose not