Brandy Melville- only sells one tiny size. Why is this allowed to happen?

[S0rrel]

So since the first lockdown my dd is one of many teenagers contributing to the huge spike in Anorexia. It’s is deadly and incredibly difficult to beat once it has taken hold.

She needs new clothes and mentioned Brandy Melville. Went on to tell me they only sell one tiny size and her friends tell her she is small enough,barely able to hide her glee. Talk about putting dreadful pressure on already susceptible girls. How are we as parents supposed to battle crap like that. I did the women come in all shapes, how deplorable spiel. Went on complete deaf ears.

Why are they allowed to do this? What messages are we sending out to young girls.

The people saying it's fine clearly (and luckily) have no experience of how eating disorders work.

This would have caused me no end of stress as a teen.

They are measuring it flat across, it's not the circumstance. Don't panic !!! I expect they are suggesting you would need to be a 30 inch bust which is possible for a tween or very young teen without having an eating disorder, but past about that I would think girls would start to get a more womanly figure.

Wanting to be thin plays a massive part in Anorexia

For some, not for the majority.

Yes but for someone like my DD 14 it's really difficult to find clothes she likes in her size as girls clothes are too small or childlike and adult clothes too big or expensive so BM works brilliantly for her age and size. She's a size 6 now but was a size 4 last year so is filling out. Once she gets too large for BM she'll accept that and buy elsewhere. But it's an easy cheap place to shop
She likes the fact she's filling out as it's trendy to be thicker set these days with bigger boobs, legs and bum. She's gone from stick thin 4 to curvy 6 and prefers it

Oh and the OP isn't saying the shop is causing her DD's eating disorder; she's saying it's existence and general concept is incredibly triggering to people with anorexia.

12" bust

@Perpetualheadache

The people saying it's fine clearly (and luckily) have no experience of how eating disorders work.

This would have caused me no end of stress as a teen.

I don’t think it requires much imagination to see how awful and embarrassing it could be to not be able to wear the clothes all your friends are wearing.

What a vile shop. Entire business model is based on getting teenagers to advertise that they are thin enough to fit into the clothes, and use this as a form of superiority over their peers. Like “I can fit into this overpriced junk, you can’t and therefore you can’t be cool.”

The problem is that girls with eating disorders have latched on to it as a kind of validation.

Bt that is what happens with eating disorders, it's not really about the shop. The same thing can happen with specialised diets or exercise programs that are fine when used appropriately.

Aspiration towards this is part of the illness.

DD and her friends wear their stuff. Personally, I think it's over-priced for what it is. It's kind of a Californian girl look. DD is very slightly built (size 4 to 6 - it's her natural build) and tall. The clothes fit and suit her BUT agree that the 'one size only' is not good. Apparently, the girls who work in the shop are all very much of a 'type' (I wouldn't know as I've not been in). The clothes are defo designed for model proportions (although not fashion forward IMO).

According to a dress size chart a 31" bust is a uk size 4 roughly.

not wishing to wade into the anorexia debate about which i know nothing but two comments,
firstly most of the clothes are stretchy and probably fit a reasonable range of sizes
secondly one size stops people ordering something in every size with the intention of returning at least one.

Their clothes aren’t that tiny most are v stretchy too
I have one dd who they got perfectly another who is so petite they drown her so she’s upset about that

Just had a look and the clothes don't seem anything special at all - no different from what you might get in a high street shop.

@Plutoh

Wanting to be thin plays a massive part in Anorexia

For some, not for the majority.

For most teenage girls, it's a big factor.

The clothes look like charity shop stuff.

@isitjustlockdown

I am fairly certain the 14/17 inch busts are referring to side to side measurements, not the circular measurements we are used to seeing. The garment will be 14 inches wide at the bust not to fit a 14 inch bust.

This is done a lot for vintage clothing (where sizes don't mean much as the standard measurements have changed so much over time).

Yes. A top with a '14 inch bust' will measure 14 inches from underarm to underarm and this is exactly how I list Ebay items.

They stock one size, but it appears to be a different size for each item e.g. the waist sizes of the jeans vary by a few inches. The hoodies would easily fit a size 14/16. A lot of it is stretchy. It’s a very odd shop, but they can surely produce whatever they want to, it’s always the larger sizes in the sale at teen shops because the majority are not fully grown and developed.

Seriously Brandy Melville is ONLY for young teenage girls .. yes it's one size but I know a whole range of sizes fit into them.... amongst DDs friends when they were 12/13 it was all they wanted...and some of them were very curvy and looked great in it

14" all the way round would be toddler-size

The clothes in there are actually pretty good quality which makes a change for that market!

It’s obviously deliberate branding to create an aspirational market for teenage girls.The small sizing is their usp - it creates an exclusivity that you can belong to this exclusive club.

I see it as a symptom (rather than a cause) of the pressures on young women to conform to a very limiting and often unachievable ‘perfection’. I suspect it does not cause anorexia in itself, but becomes a magnet for those who do have eating disorders.
Anorexia is a complex disorder, it’s much much more than just being sold unrealistic body images, but I can imagine the horror OP is feeling at seeing those sizings.

Plutoh do you have a link? Yes control is part of it and a variety of things can cause it( including a desire to get healthy or fit in, lose weight etc )weight and desire to be thin, fear of putting on weight is a huge part of the disease though. You just have to read the hoards of posts on forums I belong to to see that.

OP is your dd Weight restored?

I'm sorry fir your struggles with your DD and I hope she's better soon 💐

However, you're taking it out on a retail shop that has a fairly odd strategy, but they're not doing anything wrong.

It's perfectly normal, no matter your size, not to be able to shop in every shop you might like to

When I was young I was too slim for adult clothing and in those days there really wasn't anything between children's clothes & adults clothes. BM would have been perfect!

DC now 15 is teeny, nothing of her, shes worm BM from about 11 when a friend gave her a top that didn't fit her. Some things have been too big when they've arrived it's definitely not 1 size, but it is 1 size of each thing. The girls like it because there's generally something to fit all
of them, but they're not all in the same thing. They buy from lots of different places, so they'd never know if one of them couldn't find anything there that fit. But the girls are actually all lovely to each other anyway.

You are making too much of what one shop stocks. It's far from the only place girls are buying from.