Friday, April 29

Lowkey Freshness 1.0

We all love J. Crew.  
And, man, is Jenna Lyons, killing the style game.
So why do I keep hearing the same thing over and over?  J. Crew profits are slacking.
This is just my opinion, but I am going to look at the 250 J. Crew stores for an answer.
Browsing the website yesterday, I fell in love with the J. Crew Collection Lookbook.  It is fantastic.  
Take a look below.....







These looks perfectly define J. Crew.
But where is this look in the stores? On the employees??
The only store I have ever been visually stunned by is in Miami Beach on Lincoln Rd.  It is such a beautiful store, I didn't know I was in a J. Crew.  But the experience was dampened by employees who acted like typical retail clones and looked like every other Banana Republic sales person.  
So is J. Crew having a problem translating its fabulous lookbooks and catalogs to the store level?  Or are there too many stores which appeal to a broad spectrum of average customers?
I am dying to walk into one of the stores in Chicago and see these looks jump out before me.  I'm tired of  cardigans folded in half on wood tables and button-downs lined up on hangers with all the sleeves rolled up.  There is a new way and it has to begin to trickle down to the stores soon.

3 comments:

  1. exactly. and thats what i find a mystery. the photos associated with this post are perfect templates for the 'j. crew look.' i just see the stores one step behind this image. it could be a corporate issue. i am certainly not an expert to point fingers. i just find it interesting and i'm keeping my eye on them.....

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  2. perhaps things will change at jcrew now that it went private. i'm not a big fan of drexler, but whatever.

    these pictures look great, but the fact that they are offered by a mass retailer that is expanding to europe now does prejudice me against them, for myself.

    the crewcuts store (mini-jcrew) seems like a true representation of the feel of the line.

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  3. What fun! Lovely things here. This collection is amazingly beautiful!

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