Bigger guys gravitating to offerings on internet
NEW YORK — Chris Cyr finds little to like about the big-and-tall clothes he finds in stores.
They’re “not very adventurous,” he said, and the fit can be too baggy.
And the prints tend to be odd: “A lot of Hawaiian shirts with sailboats and golf balls tend to pop in.”
But the standup comic from St. Louis said he is finding more stylish threads for bigger guys online, as some internet retailers cater to the long-overlooked group.
The companies are making larger sizes of slim-cut jeans, bomber jackets and other trendy clothes that shoppers say they’ve struggled to find elsewhere.
Bigger-sized models are used when designing the clothes, which helps make sure the proportions are right, company officials say.
Rather than just making a pair of jeans larger, for example, they also adjust the back pockets and other details.
Asos, for example, introduced a line for plus-sized men late last year.
MVP Collections, founded a year ago, sells velour hoodies in sizes up to 6XL and motorcycle jeans that go up to a size 54.
And the Winston Box, which calls itself a clothingsubscription service “for guys with some junk in the trunk,” sends as many as four items a month to members.
“There are a lot more options,” said Cyr, who pays $75 a month for the Winston Box and says the 3XL shirts he receives fit well. He also recently bought a blazer from Asos that he wears to his standup shows.
Men have long had bigand-tall shops to turn to, but young shoppers say they don’t find the trendy clothes
they crave there.
Kyle Gammon, a college fashion student who lives near Savannah, Georgia, mentioned Asos as his go-to place after he discovered its plus-size line this year. Although fit can sometimes be a question for anyone buying online, Gammon has bought a few print shirts from the site. They give him just enough room around his midsection, he said, without a lot of extra fabric in the arms. He also likes the colors and styles the site offers.
“They have a really good variety, which I’m not used to getting.”
Former pro-baseball player Mo Vaughn, who co-founded MVP Collections, said he could find T-shirts and suits in his size in stores but little else. Now his company sells items such as gray sport jackets and deconstructed jeans made with a bit of spandex for stretch.
“Why can’t we be ‘fly’ like everybody else?” Vaughn said.
Daniel Franzese, an actor who starred in “Mean Girls,” joined the Winston Box as creative director this year after seeing a Facebook ad for the company. He said stylists often struggled to find clothes for him to wear for TV roles and red-carpet events.
“Fashion forgets about the bigger male,” Franzese said.
That’s still generally true, even with the new options. Several market research firms say they don’t track or have estimates of the value of the men’s big-and-tall clothing market. And startups say that, to promote their brands, they attend events for curvy or plus-size women — because there aren’t any for big men.
Diana Smith, a retail and apparel analyst at the research group Mintel, expects that to change. She says the high obesity rate, plus an increase in the number of men who care about how they dress, will increase the demand for bigger-sized men’s clothing. The success of women’s plus-size clothing — which, according to NPD Group, had sales of $20.6 billion in the past year — also helps, she said.
At Asos, positive feedback about its women’s plus-size line, started eight years ago, pushed the company to create one for men, head designer Nick Eley said.
About 15 percent of its men’s line is now available in bigger sizes, a figure the company expects to increase. About 30 brands, including Puma and Tommy Hilfiger, also make big-and-tall sizes for the site.
Said Eley: “I honestly don’t know why it’s been a forgotten market for so long.”