California Apparel News

For years, denim hit its stride with everyone snapping up several pairs of blue jeans to wear just about anywhere, anytime.

But in recent years, denim has been seeing some new competition, which has the makers of everything denim taking a second look at what consumers want to buy.

One company taking a close look at denim has been Invista, the Kansas company known for its fibers and fabrics such as Lycra that go into denim, swimwear, activewear and other apparel.

In May, the company made a presentation at the Kingpins denim trade show in Amsterdam about consumer insights into denim. Invista plans to give the same presentation at the Kingpins show scheduled for July 29–30 at the Cooper Design Space in Los Angeles.

“What we are seeing in the denim area in Europe is that sales are pretty flat. In the United States, men’s sales last year were pretty flat, up 0.2 percent, and women’s were up 4.5 percent,” said Jean Hegedus, Invista’s global segment director of denim.

But men’s active bottoms sales last year were up 24 percent, and women’s leggings saw a 59 percent jump in sales. “We think, directionally, it is showing a trend,” Hegedus said.

In Piper Jaffray’s 27th semiannual “Taking Stock With Teens Survey,” conducted this spring, denim didn’t even make it to the top 10 fashion trends. Coming in at No. 1 was leggings, and No. 2 was the Pink label from Victoria’s Secret, followed by Uggs and then boots in general. High-waisted pants and skirts ranked No. 5. “This is the first time in a number of years that denim was not voted by U.S. teen girls as a top 10 fashion item,” Hegedus observed.

According to Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst at The NPD Group, the activewear category is on fire and will remain hot for a while.

Invista started doing its own investigations into megatrends out there and found that they are being influenced by people with too much to do and not enough time to do it all. “People want clothing to be able to dovetail from one activity to the other,” Hegedus said.

They also don’t have a lot of time to shop at malls or try on clothes.

To help shoppers with little time and more activewear needs, Levi’s and Adidas are doing performance denim that adheres to an active lifestyle. Those new products can be yoga jeans, jog jeans or knitted denim. Blue-jeans makers are employing stretchy fibers normally reserved for activewear and integrating them into denim pants.

Consumers are also into “small indulgences.” In the food world, this means you buy yourself a gourmet cupcake, a pound of premium coffee or a scoop of premium ice cream. The Piper Jaffray study found that teens are spending more money on food than clothing.

“In the denim industry, we found that a small indulgence could be spending more on jeans that really keep their shape,” Hegedus said. “In our consumer research, fit is the No. 1 driving force for women about whether they will buy a pair of jeans or not.”

Consumers are also looking for things that make their lives easier. They tend to buy clothes that are small, medium or large rather than having a complicated array of waist sizes and leg lengths. Buying denim is not always the easiest task when shoppers are faced with a wall of blue jeans that come in eight different silhouettes and three different rises.

One solution is measuring machines such as Me-Ality that calculate your measurements and then tell you which jeans in the store fit best. Me-Ality is being used by Bloomingdale’s at its store in South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, Calif., and at its outlet in Santa Monica Place in Santa Monica, Calif.

Invista conducted a study in six countries with 3,000 men that showed that most male shoppers use the Internet when searching out information about buying blue jeans. Then they seek out information from their friends. “One thing that came out loud and clear is that men use the Internet or a brand’s website to research jeans. It underscores that a brand should have a good, consumer-friendly website,” Hegedus said.

Some 82 percent of men said that fit and comfort were very important when buying blue jeans. Another 72 percent said their denim pants had to be easy to move around in.