Alert Captain Obvious: Abercrombie And Fitch Is For Thin And Beautiful Customers Only
COMMENTARY | Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries recently made headlines for announcing that he only wanted ‘thin, beautiful and cool’ kids shopping at Abercrombie & Fitch stores. Now, the internet is up in arms, with strongly worded open letters to Abercrombie and Fitch and Mike Jeffries, and even Inquisitr’s own Kim LaCapria calling Jeffries a “partially melted penis candle.”
My question is this: Has no one ever been inside of an Abercrombie & Fitch store? Has no one ever seen half-naked, live models standing outside of an Abercrombie and Fitch store location? Has no one ever seen the Abercrombie & Fitch store employees? Has no one ever seen an Abercrombie and Fitch ad, catalog or the website? Or has no one ever noticed the people that actually like to wear Abercrombie and Fitch clothing?
Or maybe you’ll remember a 2006 interview that Jeffries gave, in which he stated very openly: “That’s why we hire good-looking people in our stores. Because good-looking people attract other good-looking people, and we want to market to cool, good-looking people. We don’t market to anyone other than that.”
If you ever even noticed just one of these things, then you’ll know that Jeffries’ ‘cool kids’ statement isn’t breaking news, just more like an obvious statement of fact, which has been turned into some very successful, free public relations for the brand. The fact that now everyone has decided to become angry about a store that never bothered to hide its aims or target demographic is frankly, just a waste of time.
While obviously not in agreement with Abercrombie and Fitch or Mike Jeffries’ position, my questions are as follows: “Have you not noticed these things before? And why do you care?”
As long as Abercrombie and Fitch isn’t any breaking state or federal laws, then I hate to break it to people, but as a private company, they can target their tired polo shirts and has-been cargo shorts to whomever they see fit to do so.
Truly, if people are angry at Abercrombie and Fitch’s cool kids only and no fat chicks policy, why not just vote with your spending dollars and just choose not to shop there?
