Designer Clothes for Children : Back-to-School Wear May Cost Some Their Innocence
If you’re old enough to be reading something in this newspaper besides the funnies, this is what you may remember about shopping for back-to-school clothes:
First, the long search for a parking space in the local mall. A scream-and-slap fest with the sibling in the back seat. Being dragged past all the good stuff towards the sale racks. Arguments with one’s mother in the dressing room: “It’s hideous !” “No, it’s not, dear.” Helpful comments from sibling: “Only as hideous as usual.” Driving home with some things you wanted, some more things your mother wanted. More slapping, some whining. And, finally, at home with the booty, the consolation prize: the intoxicating smell of brand-new leather shoes.
Things are very different now. Especially in affluent areas, such as much of the San Fernando Valley. For one thing, back-to-school shopping decisions are often made by children, not parents. According to a report in Adweek, one recent study of the youth market showed that 85% of children age 6 to 15 have a say in what brand of clothes they wear. Many preteen girls won’t set foot in a store unless it carries Guess and Esprit. Even toddlers are expected to have taste.
“Although you can’t just say, ‘What do you want to wear?’ ” Woodland Hills resident Gary Marsh said of his 2 1/2-year-old daughter, Sarah, “you have to give her a choice of two things.” Right now, Sarah prefers clothes decorated with teddy bears.
Marketing Strategies Aimed at Preteen Boys
Boys, who used to be expected to make fun of their clothes-crazy sisters, are just as fussy about what they wear. According to Boy’s Life magazine, when 9- to 17-year-old boys get blue jeans for Christmas, they’re not disappointed; 67% had asked for them. Jeans makers such as Levi’s, Lee and Wrangler and shoe companies such as Nike, Reebok and Converse are developing new marketing strategies aimed directly at preteen boys.
Not surprisingly, there’s a new kind of children’s store on the scene: one that caters to well-off parents and their fashion-conscious offspring.
Kids Collection opened in Tarzana last month in a bright pink building with a facade modeled after a ‘60s Cadillac. Everything inside is designed around the sensibilities of today’s child. The boys’ section has a full-service skateboard shop and plays continuous music videos; the preteen girls’ department is aptly named “Melrose Style.” Toddlers’ clothes are arranged around a wide-screen TV tuned to Sesame Street or the Disney Channel.
This video entertainment is a cleverly potent antidote to the traditional whining and fidgeting by young children on shopping expeditions.
“Kids sit there for two hours and they’re sedated,” said Brian Lipman, who owns Kids Collection with his brother, Mark. “The mothers can just slip the clothes on them without a struggle.”
Lipman projects $3 million in sales by the end of the year.
Of course, a child’s recall of happy times in front of that giant TV set may backfire on parents later. “We had one boy come in screaming,” Lipman recalled. “I said, ‘What’s the matter?’ It turned out they had been driving by in the car and he remembered the store. He said he wanted to come back and watch Pinocchio.”
Well, small boys have always known what they liked on TV. But now they also have strong ideas about clothes.
“When you see, in toddler sizes, bow ties and suspenders--they want that,” said Sylvia Rabin, who used to run her own Tarzana children’s store and now manages Kids Collection. “They’ll cry for it. Lots of mothers don’t want to put them in pink suspenders. But the little boys want it.”
Strong Ideas
And they also have strong ideas on what they won’t wear. “A 2- or 3-year-old will tell the parent he will not wear it, “ she said. “The mother doesn’t give her opinion.”
The fashion world has taken note and has begun selling miniature versions of adult styles. In the last few years, leading men’s and women’s labels that have introduced children’s clothes include Liz Claiborne, Generra, Kenar, Motto, International News, Betsey Johnson, Jeff Hamilton, Organically Grown, Gotcha and Surf Fetish.
According to the trade magazine Earnshaw’s, projected 1987 revenue from children’s clothing is expected to reach almost $17 billion--up almost $3 billion from 1984. The statistic reflects an increase in the price of children’s clothing and an increase in the number of children.
“I don’t know how to word it, except the mothers want the children to look like them,” Rabin said. “The mother wears a mini; the child wears a mini. Young girls today are a copy of the mother. Especially in this area.”
What won’t they wear?
‘Different Breed’
“The size 7 to 14 regular cotton print dresses. . . . I think they’re darling,” Rabin said. “They won’t even look at them. They walk right past them. Gunne Sax is popular up to age 7 or 8. After that, it’s a different breed of girl.”
Sarai Brook, 11, and Julie Sperling, 12, of Woodland Hills are quite definite about the kind of clothes they want. “Esprit and Guess!” said Sarai. “Guess and Esprit!” said Julie.
What don’t they like? “Jordache,” Sarai said firmly. “I used to love Jordache. I don’t want to be rude, but . . . not any more.”
“She doesn’t like flowery things,” said Jody Shaffer, Julie’s mother. “She likes more geometrics.” She smiled as her daughter tried on a dress. “That looks so pretty on you--it flatters your blossoming figure.”
Over in the boys’ department, Ferris Bueller is lip-syncing “Twist and Shout” on the video monitor. Three boys in bright, baggy surfer shorts are skateboarding out in the parking lot.
‘They Don’t Match’
Near the cash register, 7-year-old Lindsay Malamut of Encino points out what she has planned for the first day of school.
“I’m going to wear this cheerleader thing,” she said. “And I got socks, too. No, the socks are not for the cheerleader outfit,” she added. “They don’t match.”
Is she going to get some more back-to-school clothes today? “If my Mom wants to buy me anything,” Lindsay said demurely. “Mommy! I saw another leggings and top that was so cute!”
“She knows what to say and when to say it because she knows she’s got me in a shopping situation,” said Lindsay’s mother, Barbara.
In the toddlers’ section, 3-year-old Garrett is staring quietly at Joan Rivers and Miss Piggy on the wide-screen TV. His mother, Karen Megaw of Sherman Oaks, has three other boys besides Garrett: a 12-year-old, a 9-year-old and a 1-month-old baby.
Megaw, a jewelry designer, has no qualms about paying higher prices for fashionable boys’ clothes. “If I see something I like, I’ll justify it,” she said. She added of Garrett: “He has very good taste.”
Marsh and his wife, Susan, have their own business synopsizing scripts for studios. They bring Sarah to the office every day “and she dresses up to go to work just like we do,” Marsh said. “At home, she wears jeans and T-shirts, but in the office environment, we’ve got her working already.”
Sarah, who has just finished trying on a red flouncy miniskirt and sweat shirt ensemble, makes it evident that she has opinions. “No,” she suddenly announced, apropos of nothing in particular.
There Are Limits
The Marshes are willing to spend more on Sarah’s clothes now that they last longer than when she was an infant. But, Marsh says, there are limits. “We are coming home from work one night, and we’d gone to Nordstrom,” he recalled, “and I was tired and hungry and wasn’t thinking clearly. We saw this sweater. They were wrapping it up when I noticed it was $48 . . . for a child’s sweater! I said, ‘Wait a minute! Stop!’ ”
But Brian Lipman, a native of South Africa, says the biggest surprise he had in adjusting to American tastes was what parents are willing to pay for children’s clothes. “I worried a lot about price,” he said. “But we find that what’s expensive sells as well as anything else.”
The happy smell of brand-new leather shoes for a new school year may be a thing of the past in affluent areas.
“Here,” Lipman said, “if you tell a customer, ‘Get a leather shoe--it’s practical, you can clean it,’ they say, ‘When it gets dirty, we get new ones.”
But leather seems to be moving into other areas of children’s wear. In the Kids Collection girls’ department hangs a black leather dress for $245. The same style was available in smaller sizes. But that’s where Lipman draws the line.
“I think that’s really pushing things,” he said of black leather for toddlers. “I don’t like it at all, and I don’t want the store to be associated with it. It’s still a kids’ store, and children are children. At 3, they don’t need to look like adults.”
