I really wish I could have been a fly on the wall of the meeting the marketing team had when they made this decision.... For Son de Flor, the target is women interested in timeless fashion and modesty. Overwhelmingly, that is going to translate to religious (read: conservative) women. While a partnership with an individual with over 150,000 Instagram followers might seem appealing on its face, Son de Flor doesn’t seem to understand that an individual is only an influencer for a brand if they actually influence potential customers in a positive way.
[David Ross Lawn] may have “woke” social media fans who applaud his cross dressing, but how many of them are Son de Flor’s potential customers, interested in replicating his style? Perhaps even crazier than the collaboration is the fact that when women complained in the comments, Lawn decided to antagonize them....
The brand account dug its heels a few days later, posting an image of Lawn in their dress with the words, “In a world where you can be anything, choose to be kind. Yours, Son de Flor”...
It’s almost as if they want to drive customers away in order to make them feel good about themselves; but a newsflash: “woke” activists aren’t interested in cosplaying matronly homeschool moms (as a matronly homeschool mom, I’m allowed to say this). There won’t a rush of new gender-fluid customers beating down the digital doors of Son de Flor, eager to don a long-sleeved, button-up linen dress with pockets.
I don't know. Maybe they will. Those dresses are good for anyone who wants forgiving clothing — roomy, flowing, comfortable. What conservative women like might be exactly what many transwomen and gender fluid people want. In any case, you can see that some conservative women were aggravated by seeing the dress brand that they like also liked (seemingly) by the social-media character with a beard. To me, the pictures say These clothes are really easy to wear:
Posts
108 comments:
Hey! I have an idea! If you wear jeans on Tuesday, it means you are gay!
For some reason I'm a little less freaked out by Dylan Mulvaney who makes sure he is clean shaven and tries his best to look like a girl.
It's the transgender and cross dressing dudes that still grow a beard that is most disturbing.
Or the three day razor stubble and bright lipstick...
Then again, some customers know a deliberate poke in the eye when they feel one, and will shop accordingly.
"What conservative women like might be exactly what many transwomen and gender fluid people want."
Yeah, right. I could see that. Like, if some conservative women and some transwomen and gender fluid people were all locked in a cage with a couple of raging tigers, they would all want to get out. "Let us out!", they would all shout, in near-perfect unison. Different vocal registers, but pretty much identical motivations and interests.
Hmmmm, well. Some of them might shout "Let me out!". Rugged individualists.
This guy has no interest in these dresses. He is just having a great time denigrating the women who do and getting a paycheck for it. Gays are not going to like the backlash they are creating.
When a lefty sings paeans to tolerance, I really don't believe him/her.*
*Let me put a blunt emphasis to that - it can only be one or other (based on the moment-of-conception DNA).
Clothes are used to communicate a very few things about us. If you kick any one of them to the curb you will lose customers.
In sports/culture writer Ethan Strauss's increasingly referenced "Nike's End of Men," he introduces the concept of the Undecided Whale, "The idea is that a company, as its aims grow more expansive, starts catering less to the locked-in core customer and more to a potential whale which demonstrates some interest. Sure, you can just keep doing what’s made you rich, but how can you even focus on your primary business with that whale out there, swimming so tantalizingly close? The whale, should you bring it in, has the potential to enrich you far more than your core customers ever did." He points out how stunningly badly this has worked for all or nearly all companies that have tried it, including Nike.
We can point to wokeness. It might be just greed and arrogance.
Spokesperson antagonizing customers is typically a mistake, so good luck with the new strategy.
If they just use him in print, it's a funny way to present dull dresses.
If he talks on the website, it's down the rabbit hole w/unohoo.
Lol. these give off a 17th century Russian peasant vibe. This guy looks like a Streltsy! Especially that 3rd picture.
If this gay got his glaive and picked up an arquebus, the illusion would be complete!
Let's see how sales go the next 3 months or so. Bud Light II?
Routine marketing strategy: Score points in a niche market when your product is actually a generic commodity with no true advantages. Then, hope the business survives by collecting political donations under the guise of capitalistic buying. Trade potential market share through polarization rather than broad appeal.
See Bud Light for the failure of this strategy on a massive scale.
Let's see. The company says, “In a world where you can be anything, choose to be kind. Yours, Son de Flor” Translation: 1 men can be women; 2. you're deplorable if you object. Althouse says, the pictures say "These clothes are really easy to wear." But as the compnay itself signals, that's not all they say. Message received.
To me, the pictures say These clothes are really easy to wear.
I’m sure that to a lot more women the pictures say “these clothes are designed to fit someone very flat-chested and without broad hips.” But if feminists would prefer to ally yourselves with transvestites over reaching out to conservative women, well that’s your call to make.
Is Son de Flor listed on the Stock Exchange? I need to short them.
Maybe it's because that creepy trans character is modeling them, but those dresses don't float my boat. The colors are dull and there's too much cloth. And no ornamentation--plain, plain, plain and "sensible." They look like something would have stitched up for Anne of Green Gables. Plus, who wants to wear something buttoned up to the collar bone in the summer? I can't believe that homeschooling moms can't find something a little more feminine.
I don't know if this will reach Bud Light levels, but it is another example of a brand either not understanding who its customers are or not carrying what their current customers think/care about. Either way it's a heck of a gamble that new customers will grow to exceed (and to some extent) replace your existing customers.
The one on the right looks like a Russian Cossack. Mandel is probably right. If the activists are anything to go by, transwomen (I think that's right--men who want to be women) don't want to be normal regular comfortable women, they want to be vamps, they want to be drag queens who don't take off the make-up after the performance is done.
And this ain't that.
I had noticed Orthodox Jewish women in my neighborhood wearing these dresses though I didn't know where they came from. I expect I will see them wearing something else shortly. I was just on their website and the bearded man is not there. It may be too late.
The point isn't whether or not a couple hundred crossdressers or trans women want to dress like women with conservative tastes. The point is whether women with conservative taste want to dress like the gender fluid--and what that entails for the fitness of the brand.
Apparently, anyone who aspires to a career in marketing must read Aesop's fable of the dog and its reflection.
I would imagine it's hard to market those dresses outside of plural marriage practicing compunds. That said, I think the sister wives make all their own clothes anyway.
To me, the pictures say, these clothes are really easy to wear.
Irrelevant. Normal people have decided to exercise their power, and the culture will inevitably bend their way, and sooner rather than later. And while it is true that many corporations are currently in the hands of people whose priorities are not in alignment with the only interest that counts in business, they too will bend or fall away.
It would be nice if we could be kind to one another, but the left has never been content. No matter what point has been conceded to the left in the name of harmony, yet another domain has come under attack, and yet another, until the only safe ground for Constitutional liberty becomes its six-by-two grave. The struggle was always existential, though the compromising right didn't realize it until down of the Biden tyranny. It wasn't conservatives who ignited the culture war, but they're liable to finish it.
If the Son de Flor management thinks it is wise to spit on their customers, then they should continue. Women won't care and hungry entrepreneurs will scramble to fill their closets with even nicer, easier-to-wear fashions, while drag queens and perverts will still choose raucous sheath gowns covered in sequins and marabou feathers over earth-brown twill.
At this point, it's just silly leftist attempting to piss off the normals.
Whatever. It reminds me of the phone messages left for the Christian Cake baker. Off the charts rage-filled profanity-filled death-threats and vile. Because love and acceptance.
I'm reminded of this video by Shadiversity.
https://youtu.be/lGKknZgnVJ0
" ... some conservative women were aggravated by seeing the dress brand that they like also liked (seemingly) by the social-media character with a beard."
Possibly. More likely is that conservative women, like many of us, are weary of having LGBT+ bullshit shoved down our throats as though it were normal. It is not normal.
“Some”. Eyeroll
Holy cow (haha). These fugly dresses are not enhanced by the bearded man.
If Mandel is correct about the customer base, then this was just a stupid campaign by the marketing team, all of whom should be fired. Increasingly, it appears marketing teams aren't working to improve the business prospects of their employers, but rather working to improve their own status within their peer groups. Were I the CEO, these people would be on unemployment tomorrow.
i looked, but not TOO HARD.. this Son de Flor? who owns it? is it a stock company?
BlackRock owns.. MOST of the world... BlackRock is ALL IN, on LGBTQIINC++
make sense now?
Who would you Rather Offend? Your customers? Or, your owners?
"To me, the pictures say These clothes are really easy to wear"
And, of course, the VERY best way to say that is to find a skinny dude with a beard to wear your clothing.
Puuuuuleeeeeseeee.
Transvestites are a tiny fraction of your market. There is no business case to appeal to them, particularly at the risk of reducing your business with your paying customers.
First they came for their Bud Light, now their women’s beloved dresses, is nothing sacred?!
Plus, who wants to wear something buttoned up to the collar bone in the summer?
A lightweight cotton or linen fabric with lots of coverage actually makes more sense in the summer, as it keeps the direct sunlight off your skin, while still allowing a bit of airflow so that it isn't stifling.
update:
It took me awhile, but (apparently) Son de Flor is a private company, with Less Than 25 employees
So, not many people are buying these clothes? Correct my if i'm wrong.
As a private companies don't have public stock, BlackRock couldn't own their stock
(BUT! could STILL own a chunk (or ALL) of the company).. I couldn't find out WHO claims to own it
Even So, private companies sell bonds (especially If they want to expand from having Less Than 25 employees)
you know who buys bonds? that's Right! BlackRock buys bonds
Yancey Ward said...
Increasingly, it appears marketing teams aren't working to improve the business prospects of their employers,
Right, they are working to improve standing with BlackRock, which Owns The World.
Were you the CEO, you would be on unemployment tomorrow.
BlackRock Inc is relatively unknown outside financial circles, but it owns the largest share in the biggest 299 companies in the world.
BlackRock Inc, held or controlled 6.1% of the assets of the 299 companies (around US$3 trillion) in 2009
and THAT, was back in 2009
"Those dresses are good for anyone who wants forgiving clothing — roomy, flowing, comfortable. To me, the pictures say These clothes are really easy to wear"
That might have been a nice response to the women who were irritated. Instead the reply was: “look! A wild TERF appeared! See ya”
There's a recipe for success! Reminds me of the slogan Nick Nolte's character in North Dallas Forty made up when he learned his teammate was opening a restaurant: "Joe Bob's Fine Food. Eat here or I'll kill you."
"The idea is that a company, as its aims grow more expansive, starts catering less to the locked-in core customer and more to a potential whale which demonstrates some interest. "
Once in a while, the whale takes the hook. I consider a strong recent example the Marvel Movie about the Black African King superhero: Black Panther. The character goes back to the 1960s so has the same sort of recognition factor among comic fans boosting most of the other (frankly, second-tier) superheroes of the Marvel Movie Universe. The "Panther" character also has name recognition, or perhaps mis-recognition, due to the US political Black Panther movement.There's other factors, but in short the movie drew all the same large pool of fans that flocked to Spider-Man and Iron-Man movies AND drew in a bunch of US Black movie ticket buyers that haven't really been as pointedly targeted since Sidney Poitier and Bill Cosby brought us all "Uptown Saturday Night" All the Comic book fans plus alls the US Blacks... yep, landed the whale.
Now, try boosting the audience among non-fans by gender bending the lead character. All the Doctor Who TV fans and all the US/UK lesbians. Hmmm.
Try again. "Reveal" that Dumbledore was gay, to target all the Harry Potter fans AND all the grey-bearded gay guys. Hmm, again.
Add to all the beer drinking twenty-something frat guys the bulk of all the femme-face you-tube performers. Even if you hook and bring aboard that "whale", would you notice?
Sorry, but while the Black audience is significant, the LGBTQIA+! audience is too small and too fragmented to really boost the overall market share, even if the experiment one-sidedly succeeds. If a seller actually does somehow bring in a new bunch of customers in that arena, at the expense of its existing customer base, it's a net lose.
How often can a seller, in an already niche market like "homeschooling matrons' day wear", afford to make a mistake?
Perhaps Son de Flor wants to disassociate itself from conservative homeschooling type moms as these women and their world view isn’t compatible with the companies owners. Who knows maybe this move will attract left wing straight women, some trans women and cross dressers. The fact that conservative women will no longer buy their dresses, the dresses may look more attractive to women who didn’t want to wear one because they were a preferred dress for right wing women. Left wing women don’t want to be associated with companies or people that approve of the overblown hysteria over trans and gay people.
"First they came for their Bud Light, now their women’s beloved dresses, is nothing sacred?!"
Every pride float in major metros this year had "SATAN SUPPORTS PRIDE!" banners in the vanguard. So unless black magick and fedora-edgy wiccan ceremonies are sacraments then no..."they" don't think anything is sacred.
You're sharp today Inga. Sharper than usual.
“ Our story started from one beautiful Dress we used to see our Mother wearing on many occasions when we were little girls. Having grown in Lithuania, a small country near the Baltic Sea, we replicated this iconic Dress from the fabric we loved the most - linen, and called it a Classic Dress. The dress became the foundation for our timeless, slow and sustainable fashion brand which you now know by the name of Son de Flor. " - from the company website
So it’s about Lithuania.
This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress.
Bud Light was already widely known and dependent on very high volume. I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers.
I don't know. Maybe they will. Those dresses are good for anyone who wants forgiving clothing
No professor, they won't. Clothing is a choice and a statement, and Son de Flor chose to mock their customers.
David Ross Lawn is mocking the women who wear those dresses. He is courting outrage by saying, "Look at me! See the beard? I'm obviously a man, so if you have more of a masculine physique or look ridiculous trying to act feminine, then this brand is for you."
This is the DRL's website:
david ross lawn is an emerging composer and performer of contemporary vocal & solo piano music. his compositional output holds notable features: from national television to high fashion media campaigns.
That is DRL's choice of pronoun. Whatever he says today about being "gender fluid" is irrelevant. He's got a beard and uses "his" as a pronoun. He also scoffs at conventional capitalization.
DRL has nothing to lose in this campaign. Any publicity will help his brand, but Son de Flor is likely to take a hit.
"This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress."
So said the Bud Light marketing team.
The fist photo is referencing the Mario Brothers mushroom. He’s making fun of the brand.
The question is, will a campaign against Son De Flor go viral among its current customers? I'm pretty sure that Prof. Althouse hasn't read a bulletin board (physical or electronic) from an evangelical church or a Christian academy in her entire life, so the answer is that she will never know.
I might know, but them as knows don't tell.
Assistant Village Idiot said...
We can point to wokeness. It might be just greed and arrogance.
Throw a lack of basic understanding of business in general and I think you have a winner!
"This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress."
Given the product, this is very doubtful to work- this was always going to be a niche product in today's world, and this niche won't suddenly change demographics- they will still be selling to exactly the same kinds of women they were selling to before. The best they can likely hope for is to replace the customers they have just lost. Negative publicity is called negative publicity for a reason.
Althouse said "In any case, you can see that some conservative women were aggravated by seeing the dress brand that they like also liked (seemingly) by the social-media character with a beard.". I think this is wrong. My guess is not that the customers are upset that the bearded dude also likes the same dresses they do, but they are upset that the company who makes those dresses decided to hire a bearded dude to sell them.
It's easy to wear, attractive, and is very good at hiding those spontaneous inconvenient boners that crop up when you look in the mirror and see yourself in a dress.
Practical and stylish is a timeless aesthetic. Even the normies agree on that point.
Never heard of the company. Went to their website.
They have testimonials and photos of customers wearing the dresses. All of those photos are well-shot and outdoors. Why is this person shot so clumsily indoors? The framing and artistry are not up to the standard at the website. The customer photos are more enticing than the model shots and a great marketing plan. They could've presented this transwoman in a kinder and more attentive way if they were really trying to reach another branch of customers.
I don't care who buys the dresses (as long as it's not me -- they're ugly and uncomfortable-looking), but I do care if someone is selling something that isn't the clothing.
Blogger Ann Althouse said...
This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress.
You're right. Like women with penises competing in women's sports. This is just another example of women allowing their space to be invaded. Bathrooms too. Now practical, very wearable dresses. However, I'm not sure we've yet seen a transgender dude with a beard, competing in women's sports. Won't that be something fun!!! But here we have a bearded dude in a dress. God bless.
Blogger Ann Althouse said...
Bud Light was already widely known and dependent on very high volume. I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers.
The light beer market is a male dominated market. Blue collar guys. Frat guys. Sports bar guys. Guys don't put up with this shit. Women don't invade our "space". We beg them to come in. But Dylan Mulvaney is another story. And it's a different story for men when this shit starts invading the space of children, which real men are sworn to protect.
Perhaps this is why college educated white women are much more "tolerant" of having kids spaces invaded by transgenderism, and even push it on kids in female dominated public schools. They don't care if their space, or the kids' is invaded. By fucking with the kids space, they are indirectly fucking with the protective patriarchy. Good strategy. Resentful and twisted. But good.
Men on the other hand...
"I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers."
I could have believed that before seeing the dresses. These appear to have been made specifically for the ne plus ultra of the conservative, homeschooling crowd.
I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers.
Like the Philadelphia mass shooter ? Maybe the bra maker should get a boost from saying he was wearing their product.
I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers.
Like the Philadelphia mass shooter ? The bra company that made his bra should try to get in on the action.
What I think has happened is that the progressive forces that shape our culture have been focused on sexuality now for some years. Focused unfortunately on perverted sexuality, with a seeming endless fascination and appetite for it. And through their dominance in the communications field, these progressives have managed to create a fad, as other fads have been created in the past. The difference is, this is a highly-damaging one for young people, the impressionable favorite targets of such campaigns. Now we have various reports dribbling in on sharp, unexplained increases in gay / bisexual / furry / etc. sexual interests and claimed orientations that make no apparent societal or biological sense - until one puts them in the context of fads.
I think these folks have now been dining to excess on their own bullsh*t, and are smacking their lips and complimenting the cook, that is to say, themselves. Nobody else believes any of it, and most are baffled at the course of events - or, disgusted by it. And also highly alarmed for their children. This explains the Dylan Mulvaney response, and others like it, soon to be joined by these frauds. They seem to think insult is a good marketing tool, when they're not too busy being clueless. Who needs evidence to the contrary?
I unfollowed and unsubscribed from their account because, as Beth B. put it, I'm tired of being deliberately poked in the eye by these companies. Are gay men and/or men who claim to be women going to be buying enough dresses to make up for what they'll lose with this collaboration, especially as the guy in the photos, upon pushback, proceeded to call every one critical, TERFs, bigots, and homophobes--not really how you should want your customer base treated.
Too much effort required in being outraged all the time. And, yes, you get to pick your own battles in the great Wokidoke Wars. But not seeing what all the fuss is about just because some guy with a beard wants to prance around in mom-dresses. I would have thought Bethany Mandel has more than enough consequential battles to fight just running Moms for Liberty, but that's up to her.
It could have been more effective if the bearded lady was also chest-feeding.
The effort to increase brand awareness doesn’t have to offend current customers.
This is a fail.
An emerging strategy for un-cool product makers:
1) Embrace LGTBQ+ in an obnoxious manner.
2) Trade a decently-sized social-con audience that loves your product for a much smaller but Enlighted audience who doesn't really dig what you make.
3) Close down.
4) PROFITS!
To be fair, "son" is right there in the name.
It’s almost as if they want to drive customers away in order to make them feel good about themselves; but a newsflash: “woke” activists aren’t interested in cosplaying matronly homeschool moms (as a matronly homeschool mom, I’m allowed to say this). There won’t a rush of new gender-fluid customers beating down the digital doors of Son de Flor, eager to don a long-sleeved, button-up linen dress with pockets.
I don't know. Maybe they will. Those dresses are good for anyone who wants forgiving clothing — roomy, flowing, comfortable. What conservative women like might be exactly what many transwomen and gender fluid people want.
The number of "transwomen and gender fluid people" in America is significantly less than the number of conservative women in America.
And the conservative women have much higher disposable income.
This is going to be a huge net negative for the company. But that's ok. because someone else will come along to pick up the market
I remember when they used to market men’s dress shirts by showing women wearing nothing but the shirt.
I still don’t get it.
"Having grown in Lithuania, a small country near the Baltic Sea, we replicated this iconic Dress...: #CulturalAppropriation
Ann Althouse said...
Bud Light was already widely known and dependent on very high volume. I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers.
"getting new customers" doesn't do you good when you lose 10 old customers for each "new" one you get".
Just how many trans and "gender fluid" people do you think buy "modest" dresses?
The point of the anti-women left is to destroy womanhood and prevent women from enjoying privacy.
See here.
No tuckery required.
It's on the kilt spectrum.
Off putting. But I'm a heteronormative binary type person. Let me ask the sig other heteronormative person in my life her opinion - she being less caustic than my cranky elderly hippie persona... She's not buying it (literally or figuratively) but refuses hurried comment. She did make a face, though I'm not sure if it was at bearded dress man or me for making her consider the photo.
No one came for Bud Lite, Inga. Some extra brilliant woke executive thought it was a good idea to hire a petite man-women to help sell a product to generation lame.
Said petite man-woman, who previously stated people who use the wrong pro-noun should be tossed in prison.
Strangely - Consumers - already sick and tired of woke BS in every crevice of American life - said no thank you.
Consumer choice V forced government-corporate woke BS at every turn.
Tho I am surprised the Biden administration didn't step in to force consumers to buy Bud Lite.
(No chi come sales - so he blew it off)
Whatever happened to the good old moo-moo?
NPR reports the apprehension of the Philly shooter; he is a they, but no word yet on his favorite fashion house.
Russia Collusion Truther and Hillary/FBI Hoax Dossier Dead Ender Inga: "First they came for their Bud Light, now their women’s beloved dresses, is nothing sacred?!"
You forgot how "they" came and are coming for the children.
So no, by definition, nothing is "sacred" to you groomers and groomer enablers.
QED
Just another on the list.
"We can point to wokeness. It might be just greed and arrogance."
You might be on to something. Companies, no matter how big, must continue to grow or they will see a decline in their stock price. Capital goes to where the most money is made.
If you sold $200B in 2000 and in 2023 are still only selling $200B, your stock will not be desired by investors.
https://sondeflor.com/collections/pre-loved
He looks like he's loving it.
Lawn is mentally I’ll and among the executives pushing this campaign is the next Alissa Heinerscheid.
This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress.
Perhaps. I'm not a potential customer, but it makes me think their PR people are every bit as clueless as the woman who wanted to expand Bud Light's customer base.
Ignore the people who made you what you are at your peril. I'm not sure if that's still taught in school now when you're studying marketing.
Sure, I know of the brand today -- I'll forget about it tomorrow -- but I don't think highly of their marketing.
As an overweight eldderly guy, I say thank goodness for Wranglers and 3XL polls. I'd still wear them even if Putin in drag was their marketing gal.
As an overweight eldderly guy, I say thank goodness for Wranglers and 3XL polos. I'd still wear them even if Putin in drag was their marketing gal.
"I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers."
If that was the plan, wouldn't a camel have worked as well? I guess not. You wouldn't have blogged a camel in a dress.
If he looks good in them, when you're telling your potential customers that they will look good too . . . so long as they kinda look like a dude.
Brilliant!
Ann Althouse: "This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress."
The many controversy's surrounding Disney's "wokening" of their movies is making many more people know about this brand's latest offering and to consider supporting these very "diverse", welcoming to all people soon to be classic movies!
https://www.dailywire.com/news/woke-disney-lost-almost-900-million-on-last-8-films-report
The many controversy's surrounding AmBev's Bud Light beer is making many more people know about this brand's powerful and passionate embrace of ESG/DEI in order to expand the market to potential new Bud Light drinkers!
https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/bud-light-sales-falling-amid-mulvaney-backlash-no-end-in-sight-rcna85832
It's almost like brands that are taken over by the wokies that decide to shove ESG/DEI/Radical trans agenda into the faces of normals are incapable of learning from market feedback signals.
Ann Althouse: "Bud Light was already widely known and dependent on very high volume. I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers."
So, they are going to become more......selective.......that should work.
Since it appears they are a private company and not exactly gargantuan in scale (130+ employees?), this will be an interesting test of the evolving reaction/counterreaction of societal forces in play here and abroad (I think they are based in Spain with the factory and old babushka seamstresses still in Lithuania) on a smaller company scale where even a modest uptick in sales amongst new woke customers jumping in globally could offset a chunk of customers that hit the bricks over this.
Time will tell.
When will climate change mean that traditional Bedouin clothing catches on? Times I have visited it seems quite sensible.
"First [sic] they came for their Bud Light, now their women’s beloved dresses, is nothing sacred?!"
Nothing, absolutely nothing... except dicks made of from arm tissue.
Ann, I think you're dug in a little too hard on your "trans marketing is no big deal" idea. When have you ever bought a dress (or any item of women's clothing) because a man modeled it? Has any woman you know ever done so? I'm guessing never, or else you would have mentioned it.
From the other perspective, why would lefty women who are otherwise open to trans marketing want to dress like conservative Christians and orthodox Jews?
Pretty sure I've seen that dress on an Amish clothesline.
Gresham's law: Bad money drives out good money.
Diversity doesn't mean welcoming all sorts of people: it means requiring traditional people to agree with their agenda. And in a free market, this means the ordinary conservative women will shop elsewhere.
"I don't know. Maybe they will. Those dresses are good for anyone who wants forgiving clothing — roomy, flowing, comfortable."
I don't disagree with this. But consider the demographics of the two groups. Even if there's a "rush" of new transgender customers, they're likely to be insignificant in the face of the "matronly conservative women" going out the exits if they succeed in alienating that group. I can't help but think that guys who choose to dress this way while keeping their male facial hair are, at least in some cases, doing so to mock the matronly conservative women who compose the demographic most likely to disapprove of them. Choosing to feature that look in their ads can easily be seen as a slap in the face to existing customers, and even for a small company it's generally not a good idea to insult your current customer base in order to appeal to a smaller group.
This controversy is effective in making many more people know about this brand and to consider buying this very wearable, practical, classic dress.
I think this dress company will do just fine and will get some new customers.
@Althouse, so now that you're explaining marketing strategy to the people in your commentariat, some of whom have had a successful career in business, what do you plan to do next? Are you going to run over to Chamberlin Hall and explain quantum entanglement to the physicists?
Frankly, without knowing the demographic breakdown of the market for this Son de Flor dress I don't see how you or anyone else can make such confident predictions. To me it resembles the sort of dresses hippie chicks wore on the communes back in the day, so if their customers are mostly superannuated hippie chicks then using a scrawny, bearded transvestite to advertise their dress might work out.
But that's probably not the way to bet.
And here's the key. Trying to expand into new markets is a good thing, because if you don't grow your market you eventually will fail. But! Growing into new markets is tricky -- if you lose a large enough portion of your current market base by trying to make a splash in a new market you'll go broke anyway.
Bethany Mandel is suggesting that a very large portion of the current market for Son de Flor is composed of conservative women, the sort of women who are willing to have more than just one or two children and who love their kids enough to put the effort into homeschooling them. If that's true, then they could go broke well before the superannuated hippy chicks and trannies can create a totally new market demographic. Do not underestimate these conservative women. Do not ever underestimate them.
I’ve ordered myself and my three daughters and two granddaughters Son de Flor dresses, can’t wait to get them. My girls will look adorable in these simple linen dresses. New market for left wing women who are happy that conservative women will no longer be wearing them. It won’t be trans women who will be buying these dresses as much as it will be non conservative women.
Right. Trans women are going for the dowdy conservative look to go with the distinguished looking beard. Lol
Russia Collusion Truther and Hillary/FBI Hoax Dossier Dead Ender Inga: "New market for left wing women who are happy that conservative women will no longer be wearing them. It won’t be trans women who will be buying these dresses as much as it will be non conservative women."
Define "woman".
“New market for left wing women who are happy that conservative women will no longer be wearing them. It won’t be trans women who will be buying these dresses as much as it will be non conservative women.”
Thank you for so eloquently illustrating the leftie point of view. It’s not the dresses that will give you joy it’s that “conservative women will no longer be wearing them.” Mind boggling.
“It’s not the dresses that will give you joy it’s that “conservative women will no longer be wearing them.” Mind boggling.”
I hadn’t heard of this company before this brouhaha. I’ve seen, liked and worn other comfortable clothing from other companies in the past. Now that I’ve been made aware of this company AND because conservative women are having a meltdown over a bearded man wearing the dresses and are now boycotting Son de Flor, I’ve got more incentive to buy some of their lovely dresses.
Lose-lose for conservative women. Gain-gain for liberal women.
Looks like common medieval men's wear.
"I'll wear a dress I never wanted to wear before to own the conservatives" is an interesting plan.
New market for left wing women who are happy that conservative women will no longer be wearing them.
Inga could actually be right about that. We shall see. Let’s not forget that the new market demographic (left-wing women) has to be larger and take shape faster than the previous market demographic (conservative women) depart. That may not happen, in which case the company goes belly up.
It won’t be trans women who will be buying these dresses as much as it will be non conservative women.
Inga and I agree about something. It’s a sign of the Apocalypse!
BTW, I showed the pictures of the trans influencer wearing the dress. Her immediate reaction was that she’s too busty to wear something that fits a scrawny, sunken-chested biological male. Which is the point I made in my comment at 11:33 yesterday.
"I've ordered myself and three daughters and two granddaughters Son de Flor dresses . . . ."
Well, I'll see that and raise you four, no five, MyPillow 2.0s! Call.
What is the purpose of marketing?
Isn't it to appeal to the widest market possible?
Then why would a company that wants to market dresses to the widest market possible-women, want to market dresses to men? A vanishingly small market.
We live in silly times.
I sent go that company's Instagram account, and could not find that gentleman's picture. Perhaps be has been deep sixed.
I predict that for every Inga, assuming she is actually purchasing these outfits, many fewer of the core consumers will stick with the brand. Few people will willingly put money into the pockets of people who openly show distain for them.
I predict that for every Inga, assuming she is actually purchasing these outfits, many fewer of the core consumers will stick with the brand. Few people will willingly put money into the pockets of people who openly show distain for them.
“Lose-lose for conservative women. Gain-gain for liberal women.”
Why can’t it be win win for both? Why not be conciliatory? Why can’t the attitude be: “I’ll be buying these dresses and I hope conservative women will come back as customers in the future.”
Apparently all this company did was share this gentleman’s Instagram feed (which I think makes fun of the dresses - and there’s nothing wrong with that). He got a lot of negative feed back and responded negatively. The company seems to have a lot of positive feedback on their other instagram photos.
Here are comments I found on ovarit.com which I found interesting:
1. “Why must men colonize everything?”
2. “Misogyny and the male gaze still maintain an overwhelming presence in women’s fashion, and we should work to change that rather than just say “look, men can be degraded by feminine beauty trends, too!” But when it comes to dresses and skirts, I say normalize it.”
3. “Why not create a brand and make "dresses" for the male form. You can't just put female clothing on a male figure and call it a day. You can't even judge the dresses because they look like a costume on him.”
4. “I honestly don't get the logic, from a radfem perspective, of criticizing a man (who admits to being a man) in a dress. How is criticizing this not weakening our arguments?”
5. “Because, at this point, it feels like appropriation. Plus, he’s wearing a dress while insulting women. There was a time when I’d see a man in a dress and shrug and be glad he was rejecting toxic masculinity or something, but those days are long over.
When we have to deal with men in our most private places and can’t object to anything they do or any boundary they cross, seeing a man in a dress now just tells me he’s a potential boundary stomping asshole.”
6. “When the oppressing group tries on the clothing of the oppressed, it just comes off as a colonist putting on tribal robes or white teenagers putting their hair in dreads.
None of that is to say men have to stay chained to the most toxic parts of masculinity, but they don’t have to wear our clothes to grow as people. They can be feminists (if we allow that any man can truly be a feminist) whilst wearing pants.”
7. “He's caping for the entire trans rights movement though. My irritation was more at the company needing to bandwagon for TQ than at that individual man.”
8. “ Ugh, the handmaiden - 'I'm just so glad everybody gets to enjoy your dresses.'”
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