Jack Wills - do you shop there?

[lovesunnydays]

Looked in today for the first time with DD (14) who loved EVERYTHING.

I advised her to study the look and maybe emulate it from other (less pricey shops).

Please tell me that I am not being too mean/frugal but £225 for a blazer and £69 for a hoody is surely pushing most budgets.

Hate the way it's branded with oversized 'Wills' logo everywhere. If the clothes were really nice people would buy them without that. People are paying for the brand as a status symbol rather than the clothes which seem fairly ordinary, though in a nice ordinary way.

Agree 100% with the preppie private school iphone image - sums it up very accurately.

Bobbie IKWYM but there is prob a difference in stereotyping advantaged kids rather than disadvantaged ones...isn't the whole point that it is aspirational so they wouldn't mind?

I dunno.
I feel stupid buying stuff there knowing it's for kids though. So I just keep to the less obvious stuff - their long sleeve tops are good, someone recommended them on here for having a good length - I was tempted by the flared skirts but realised very quickly that I am yes, very much too old for those...and always was, somehow...

and I had some fairisle socks from them that went through the toe within 2 DAYS. They were reduced from about £45 to £14, sent them back.

I feel very uncomfortable with the idea that JW is "essential kit or 11 year olds".
To expect £69 hoodies at that age is quite inappropriate, and puts parents under awful pressure. My dd regularly tells me that so and so at school has 10 Abercrombie and Fitch tops- she has none. I have told her that once she stops dropping bolognese sauce down her and can save up 50% of the cost, I MAY consider it. Until then, it's Matalan and Uniqlo.

'if you lot were saying Primark was for chavvy kids from comprehensives, we'd be rightly up in arms.'

Yeah but saying Jack Wills is for independent school kids isn't really offensive is it? Whereas associating people with cheap and cheerful Primark is rather more so.

It's not even about rich kids vs poor kids, I think the point is it is made for kids (well, teens). Hell, I don't even shop in Top Shop any more as it makes me feel old and I am 29!

It's against my principles to pay that mmuch for a top.

These principles may well disappear when I have a teenager.

It's pretty much the uniform for rah-rah posh teens with big hair, isn't it?

It IS a young brand - look at the sizes, listen to the music, observe the foetus-like staff.

It IS an expensive brand - look at the prices full stop.

Therefore saying it's aimed at rich kids is hardly libellous. And by observation, yeah, the local branch is patronised by private school kids with more hair than is strictly necessary, who appear to have gone out in their pyjamas.

Think any stereotyping and labelling of kids is offensive.

And would anybody want to be called a "rah rah"?

Don't like reverse snobbery any more than plain old snobby snobbery.

Nobody had said that when I posted, Bobbie...and yes stereotyping of kids isn't particularly desirable but they tend to create their own stereotypes deliberately, at least that is how it appears...it's called 'fashion', well that's my interpretation.

The ones who subscribe to it seem to desire that label. Though making the label an offensive or derogatory one is unkind.

There is an undeniable public school fashion thing though, I think that is evident - isn't it?

I shall rephrase then - it is worn in large groups by teenagers about which I know nothing at all except what they look like, and so I cannot make a comment.

I find 'rah rah' to be a useful way of conveying the image that this style of dress gives off. The children are probably just as nice/interesting/clever/funny as any random group of kids walking down the street, but you asked what we think of their clothes.

Yes, there are tribes among kids, always have been. It's part of growing up.

Part of being grown up, though, is to realise that clothes are just a uniform and not the whole person.

So to dismiss whole swathes of young people who appear to be economically advantaged as "rah rahs" and "yuppies" seems a bit mean...as mean as dismissing young people who appear to be economically disadvantaged as "chavs" and "hoodies".

And the prevailing attitude seems to be "they're rich so they can take it".

Because rich kids don't have feelings?

Think I'm bringing the thread down, so I'll bow out.

X-posted there bobbie - we are judging/commenting on the clothes, not the person.

ROFL at "observe the foetus-like staff"

They all speak perfectly plummy English, though, don't they?

Does anyone else think that Jack Wills are unjustified in advertising their clothes as Fabulously British when most of their products are made outside the UK? My teenagers love them but I cannot see how they justify charging £70 for a blouse made in the Far East. How high are their labour costs?

I laughed out loud when I heard the Jack Wills guy being interviewed. They said to him 'your clothes and your shops are very much the British version of Abercrombie and Fitch, aren't they' to which he took grave offence and claimed that the two shops have no more in common then the fact they sell clothes to young people.

Come off it you tosser - if you could have called it Amerbombie and Witch and got away with it you would have.

It's basically a licence to charge 3 times the reasonable amount for bog average cotton clothing made in Bangladesh to teenagers who either are posh or want to look as if they are.

And the decision whether to shop there has been made for me - I'm a normal UK size 14 but neither A&F or JW have anything in their women's ranges I could pull over one arm or one leg.

It's not for fat chicks, they don't get to be on the team. 'Fit in or fuck off' etc.