It saddens and baffles me that post-Christmas, the most headline-worthy fashion newsbit relates to the UK high street retailer Next. Boxing Day 2007 was officially the busiest day in British retail history and in the wee hours of the morning, queues were forming at stores, namely Next and Marks and Spencers. Two women collapsed at the Next store in West Midlands, another was taken to hospital with breathing difficulties and another was trapped in a door. Ludicrously, West Midlands Ambulance Service had to issue some ‘sales queuing advice’ to people ‘A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman said: "Our staff were somewhat surprised to get so many calls to different branches of the same clothing company.
"If you are planning to attend and queue in the future, pleases ensure that you wear suitable clothing to keep warm and either have had something to eat and drink before going or take it with you so that you don’t become dehydrated or hungry."
Let me get this straight… All of this grief…. for NEXT?!?
I’m really not sure what it says on a whole about the British shopping nation that people are willing to stress themselves out over the possibility of picking up some shoddy cut trousers, coats that won’t last and shoes that are made of pleather. It’s not a matter of brand snobbery here. I love a good bargain as much as anyone and yes, I contributed to the online Christmas Day sales surge with my sale buys from Topshop.
However, I feel that people aren’t really weighing it up in their heads properly when getting shopping happy. A guy loading up on cheapie ¬£12 dress shirts (i.e. shirts intended for the office) could have bagged a wonderfully cut, beautifully shirt from Givenchy at ¬£59. The number of wears you get out of aforementioned Next shirt = 12. Let’s say once a month because said guy has bought a gazillion of these shirts for about a year before it gets binned/ruined in the wash…). The number of times you get out of Givenchy shirt = 72+. Worn twice a month because it’s spesh enough to wear out as opposed to at the office and over many more years providing guy doesn’t balloon. I use a guy’s shirt as an example just because it’s interesting how the ratio of male/female shoppers in this Next sale frenzy was quite evenly split.
Now we are into 2008, I will stick to my past prediction of saying that hard, fast, cheap fashion simply isn’t sustainable and that we will soon learn the values of paying a little more but ultimately getting a lot more for your buck.
I totally agree – I would never queue at Next, and I think it highly unlikely that any of your readers would… But – your fashion maths doesn’t quite add up.
One shirt, whether Givenchy or George at Asda can only be worn once a week, unless your tumble-dryer turn-round is very fast.
Next’s quality isn’t THAT bad so he would be able to wear it once a week for a year, at least. Therefore buying five shirts for the monday – friday slog for ¬£60 is just what Mr High Street is looking for (or his wife, searching for ‘special’ non-iron fabrics).
One Givenchy shirt, however well constructed, is still just one shirt and if you are working in the accounts department in a factory in Darlington you want bulk, not specialness and sadly that’s what a lot of lowly paid workers in the UK need (they can’t afford to worry about poorly paid workers in the far east).
I agree with everything Anon, what’s the point of one Givenchy shirt when you need five of them?
Ok…maths isn’t my strong point and anon you maybe right. Perhaps my mis-calculation is really a blatant way of showing my inner urging to get people to see the joys of finer cutting, love cottong and making themselves feel good whilst working at said account dept. job in Darlington factory. It’s not even the origins of Next garments that is in question…. guys at the office have told me their Next bargain/nightmare stories and it doesn’t sound peachy at all…
I’m a dreamer not an economist so I still believe that eventually, our love for fast and furious fashion will slip…especially when the pricing of better quality clothes will lessen as demand increases….
Apologies but I still think queuing at Next with the chances of injuring yourselves is just potty….
I totally agree with you, Susie…I mean, NEXT???? Hhmm….
I agree this it is absolutely ridiculous behaviour to queue for the sales at this time in the morning. The advice given by the ambulance service is stating the obvious isn’t it. I am convinced that the stuff in some of the high street sales is a load of rubbish. How come something in my usual size in the sales is no where near big enough. Or perhaps that was because of too much wine and mince pies!
To take it to the extreme there’s always these options…
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/body_and_soul/article3103512.ece
the next sale scares me. but then so do most shops on a saturday afternoon nowadays.
I sort of think the problem is with Next itself, you know? Next is cheap, but it’s not *that* cheap, and personally you can get more for your money, with not such a horrifying loss of quality, by going to Primark. I think that’s where shoppers can get into trouble, actually – by not actually investing in quality (Givenchy) or actually buying cheap to save (Primark.) Going down the middle isn’t satisfying on either level, really.
I used to work the Next sales as a temp in my student days, and the fray that ensues is *intense*. People would camp out overnight to get in. I can’t understand what the hordes drive in for though, while Next quality is not atrocious, they really epitomise absolute bland, wishy-washy nothingness in taste, middle-ground, middle-England ambivalence. It’s the one characteristic you can spot in their clothes from a mile off – the total lack of personality.
I have never, ever brought anything from next. Its so teacher-y.
My brother worked their, and he said about 20 people spent over £600. One woman spent £1000 and brought nearly everything in any size or condition.
Next confuses me. I went in with my mother to look for her… (funny, ^natalie calls it teacher-y, my mum is a teacher! Says it all) and what I thought was a mumsy store has turned into some wannabe “hip” shop with tacky primark-esque prints and sequins. Nothing worth nearly dying over, surely?
love your blog and agree about the blandness of next, but just wanted to mention that most next shoes are leather. i’m vegetarian so i check every shop looking for ‘pleather’.
i’m totally in on that- not buying cheapie stuff over the more expensive version, which does seem to happen especially when buying plain t-shirts/shirts/jumpers because they seem the same. brand snobbery or not, if i’m wearing a ¬£30 TS jumper over a ¬£4 primark one it feels better even if it looks the same!
but i was in birmingham on boxing day and saw the huge ‘open at 5am’ signs in the same Next window that put 2 of the women in hospital, the other in a store even closer to my home! i don’t think the people that shop there can afford a ¬£60 shirt, there are many really poor and run down areas in the WM which i guess is why you have to buy cheap in bulk, especialy if their jobs don’t require them to dress perfectly. it always amuses me though that you will never fail to see a family with 2 buggys and 5 kids in primark at 3pm on a saturday! why?!
I just feel bad for the people who got the worst of it…though it’s hard to imagine such enthusiasm for a store that’s as bland as people say.
God, I’m sure in one photo I saw a man carrying a practically new-born baby into the Next sale. Apparently, a lot of people shop the Next sale for kids clothes. I guess they can get the whole year’s shopping done in one go. Whatever…
I preach your last paragraph all the time!
This is kinda funny to me even I have no idea what “Next” is. Vivienne Westwood has been preaching the quality over quantity idea for a long time now too. I totally agree, but sometimes my blue-collar/coupon clipping/finding deals mentality gets the better of me….I love a good H&M sale!
i dont live in the uk so ive never entered a Next store and dont really know much about the quality…but i just have one question…what about the people who go there because they can only afford to buy one 12 pound Next shirt…how on earth would they justify something from Givenchy. i mean, 12 pounds for a shirt is pretty expensive as it is. but maybe thats just me..
this taught me something! i shall value that lesson.
NEXT is the epitome of bland. I once made the mistake (borne of desperation) of buying a trouser suit from there. It was so hideous I wanted to weep when I wore it. It made me look like a traffic warden or a chemistry teacher. It’s not that cheap, either. But it’s definitely nasty.
I think many of the commenters above have hit the nail on the head: I too have never seen the attraction of the Next sale. I can go months without seeing anything I like in Next. They’re good for office worker basics (so long as you’re not tall) and I suppose the petites section is good, but that’s all.
I do like that the shoes go up to a 9 though. But what’s the point of queuing up at 5am when most major cities have a Next outlet now anyway?
That story about the Next Sale is one of the most depressing things I have ever heard. Queueing up to buy bland, poor quality clothes on Boxing Day: what has this country come to?
I propose that someone tests out the longevity of a designer shirt vs. a Next shirt to see which in fact is more cost effective.
Of course I see that people aren’t necessarily going to be able to afford a ¬£60 shirt but I think there is a definite economic benefit to buying less and spending more…. I haven’t quite got the economic model worked out in my head yet but somehow…it’s making sense to me…
Either that or I’m just sort of sick about the glut of new cheap clothes that we are being fed and this post makes no economic sense whatsoever…
I work at a Next clearance store to get me through uni therefore I am very aware of the quality of their clothes and definately need to consider saving money as I am a student. Next clothes can be bland however this and next season’s directories have become more fashion forward and I starting to find myself actually using my discount to buy clothes for me, rather than on smellies sets for relatives. We have to wear Next formal wear as uniform for 6 months of the year, week in week out. They do last and I consider the clothes to be quality for the price. They don’t fall apart in the first wash unlike Primark.
The sale behaviour of customers is certainly bizzare but many of these people that I’ve served can’t afford the luxury of a Givenchy shirt and have to queue to buy themselves clothes to last them the year.
Next customers aren’t looking to be on the cutting edge of fashion, they want smart clothes at a price they can afford and for some people getting there early enough ensures that there will be stock in their size.
Also most of our shoes are in fact leather and I’ve had the same pair of mary janes with a 4inch stacked heel for a year and they still look great! They cost me just ¬£8.00 in the sale!
Next knows its bland thats why its trying to move on up fashion wise and pricewise, be interesting to see if it attracts new customers or alienates middle england in the process.
Next quality is actually quite good construction wise, some of the fabrication is a bit crap but cut and styling is definitely bland! But I think middle england would want the ¬£12 shirts at a reasonable quality and a variety of them than pick up 1 special shirt and wear it to death..:) It makes sense for most people but its Uniqlo for me…
Argh! Who queues for anything – I cant! I agree, I could think of nothing worse than queuing up for the Next sale at some ungodly hour however I do think generally Next have got a bit more fashion forward and I have ordered a few pieces (prior to the sale) for work and also play! I have the animal print coat which I love and wear it in a much more quirky way than the adverts show and I also have a fab brown jewelled dress purchased for work but great for eve too. I also found a navy blue satin bubble dress which is quite Lanvin. If you look hard enough, there are some reasonable priced stuff which is quite trendy too!
I worked in the sales at Next and was just starting to write my on blog about what a terrible experience it was and I thought I’d see what Style Bubble was saying aboyut sales in general when I saw that you were talking about the brand that I’d been temping at for the last 2 months.
Due to said job I know the Next collections quite well and to be honest it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, all the party wear in for christmas was well designed and though nothing really beautiful, individual or amazing came out of the collection it was a fashionable, well priced and as good a collection that you can expect from I high street multiple that is aimed at a slightly cheaper and older market than us who are discussing now. I believe Next does do good quality for the price you pay (and suits aren’t half as horrible as the ones in Dorothy Perkins where I’ve also worked).
But anyway back to the sales I started work at 5 in the morning the day after boxing day and the queue was from the store all the way up to the metro station at the top of the street (we reckon around 300 people) and it was crazy, people ran in when we hadn’t even finished having our team talk from the manager and everyone had huge clear plastic bags which they were just stuffing things into. Within the first 5 minutes three of the really big glass bottles of bubble bath were lying smashed on the floor due to the choas e and another temp had to “guard” the area whilst senior staff cleaned up it was horrible. And yes there were insane people with babies in pushchairs at 5 in the morning ridiclous! And loads of heavily pregnant women (odd seeing as we don’t stock maternity). That day was insane, I’m very glad my shift was only 4 hours.
That day was bad but after that you think its all over, its really, really not, you then have a week or two of working in a store that looks like Primark. Now there are lots of reasons I don’t work in Primark and this is them in order
1) theres no way those prices are ethical
2) customer service- there is none apparently its so busy that you just stand and gossip while clothes pile up around you!
3)the lack of respect- for the store, for the people who work there and for the clothes-why buy something when you’re basically gonna put it on a landfill in a month its just wrong.
I’ve got a Diploma in fashion retail so I want to work in an enviroment where I can actually feel like I’m doing a good job, where I can provide a helpful service for the two weeks I haven’t been able to do that, the store is such a tip that we couldn’t find anything for a customer even if we knew where it should be. It totally changed my attittude at work, I was stressed and bored and complaining and chatting to my friends when really I should have been out on the shop floor because really who wants to clean something up when you know it 20 minutes you’re gonna have to do it again and again untill at last you can get away from it. Seriously I love shopping but this year I haven’t bought a thing in any fashion store at all sales now make me feel ill.
Its strange I knew I’d hate it but I didn’t realise that the thing that would really get to me wasn’t the mess, or the stress but actually the total lack of respect for what they were buying. The lovely party dresses that I mentioned at the begining which were being coveted and saved up for and carefully tried on only a week before were now being thrown on the floor as if they were worthless. Its really sad, sales show how greedy and uncaring people can be just over a few pounds saved on things that they maybe didn’t need or want in the first place.
oh and you’re totally right about the Givenchy shirt Miss Bubble, quality over quantity every time.
i work at uniqlo. the quality isn’t all that. nothing I would go mad for, it’s all made quite cheaply in china that’s why it’s so cheap here. also their basic tees are completely crazy sizes, i’m a size 8 and xs cotton mix tee’s are baggy on me… what’s that all about eh? anyway, coincidently my sister works in next 😛 i agree with those saying it’s the people who can’t afford givenchy shirts who queue there but my sister used to work in the next store in canary wharf, where customers would spend hundreds of pounds on clothes for work and let’s face it, they’re not exactly strapped for cash so what’s the logic there?
i did the next sale twice…and although i can understand the need for people to stock up on cheap childrenswear…i just cant fathom out the attitudes of the people there..
1) what is with the pushing and running in?? seconds before customers were allowed in a member of staff could usually be heard shouting “go go go!!!”…i just don’t understand the “angst”…
2) why do people need to bring their kids at 5am in the morning when they know that the chances of children being trampled on/catching cold outside while waiting increases..??
3) why do people need to spend (in total) at least 3 figures (sometimes 4) on a number of items that are reduced about ¬£4?? in the branch i worked at one lady spent over ¬£1000 on childrenswear…there were couples shopping in one department, queueing, exiting the store and then returning empty handed to shop in other departments. i don’t know, maybe this type of thing requires weeks of planning ahead??
and although i can’t totally agree on susie’s spending of ¬£XX pounds on a Givenchy shirt (i for one – with my past wages couldn’t warrant spending anything over ¬£30 on anything to wear to work and tend to savour higher priced goods for special occasions), i think it’s unreasonable to say that the rowdy sale shoppers at next can’t afford to spend money on higher quality items.
i’d be interested to see what would happen if all primark stores held a similar type of sale i.e. “everything for ¬£1 or less”…something similar to the opening of ikea in edmonton maybe lol…it doesn’t really bear thinking about does it…