This is going to bore 90 % of you. My apologies. Still, if something needs saying, it needs saying.
If you know me in real life, perhaps you know that Johnny Rotten designs tees in his off time. In fact, lots of people I know design, and I love their work. Buzatron, Grrlmarvel, Fishbiscuit Designs, Cubik Designs, Inkone? They’re all excellent, and you really ought to stalk them on Facebook because they have the ninevoltcandy seal of approval stamped on their creative little noggins.
Unfortunately, I can’t do much more than yell congratulations, mazel tov and mabrook at them when they get a print on a daily tee site. As much pride as I would take in wearing something that an awesome friend of mine made, I can’t, because I refuse to wear clothes that make me look really terrible.
It’s not the graphic they’ve made, not at all. The problem is with sizing and flattering cut. To put it as bluntly as possible, I am tall, I am broad shouldered, and I am stacked. As well you know, I am definitely all of these things, but Im not freakishly built. A person wouldnt look at me and automatically think that I am an adult entertainer specializing in big boob fetishes, nor would they see my height and assume that I was once a star player in the NBA. I’m actually fairly average. Like, I could never make it in a sideshow based on my physical characteristics, and would have to rely on skill alone. This makes me kind of sad, because I feel like a dream that I didn’t even know I had was just ripped away from me, but such is life for us average folk.
For you Numberspeople, Im 5’9, 165 lbs, and have a normal BMI. My bust measures 40 inches, my ribcage 33, and my waist 31.
See, thats me, drinking beer at a hockey game like a boss, or at least like a typical Canadian. My figure is….yes, it’s there. Nothing to write home about, unless you habitually write home about subjects that are duller than plastic butter knives.
So yeah, anyway, the size and design options from nearly every daily site do not work for me. I need a ladies cut to flatter my bust, as mens/unisex shirts are cut differently, and hang off of my broader points in a way that makes me look 30 lbs heavier.
This is me, again. My actual weight and shape between the first picture and this one is the same. So where’d those extra inches and pounds come from? Not cool, shirt.
That unisex shirt obviously won’t work for me, because ewww. Shall I try a ladies shirt then?
Oh dear. Thats definitely slimmer fitting, but is unflattering in whole new, trashy, saggy boobed, pot bellied ways. Again, ewww.
The ladies cut is just too tight across my bust with most foundation garments (bras), even in an xl. Sometimes I wear them anyway, but I will assure you that having fabric puckering and gaping lines across my breasts from the shirt makes me quite uncomfortable. Not only is it physically uncomfortable but the amount of guys blatantly staring at my chest is rather unpleasant.
As a bit of a side note here, there seems to be a school of thought that if women have big breasts, they enjoy showing them off at all opportunities. That school of thought supposes that big breasted women enjoy being valued for two chunks of fatty and glandular tissue, and that their purpose is to decorate the world of complete strangers. That school of thought is bullshit. When I go grocery shopping in a daily site shirt, I am trying to get food, not titillate (ha!) some guy in the toothpaste aisle. More often than not though, thats exactly what happens when I wear a shirt with fabric straining across my bust. If you’re a guy who does this, please please please knock it the hell off. Being eyemolested is not flattering, it’s revolting.
Anyway.
Im sure Im not alone in this. As I said, Im on the bigger side, but Im pretty normal looking. If Im average, there are smaller ladies, and also bigger ones. If I can barely fit into the largest size tee, how many ladies would have no hope of fitting at all? They won’t buy because theres nothing for them *to* buy. Their dollars spend just as well as a smaller persons dollars, so why arent there as many opportunities to spend them?
Alongside that size issue, there is also the issue of flattering necklines. A v neck makes me look my height and well proportioned, particularly if its a bit of a deeper v. It makes me look good, it makes me feel good, and that in turn makes the shirt look good. Having a great looking product that is loved and worn often is quite a decent advertisement, dont you think? Unfortunately, the crewnecks have the opposite effect. They make me look shorter, wider, saggy and because of the straining fabric, trashy. It makes the shirt look poorly constructed and ill fitting, which is (when I wear it, which isnt often) actually going to work against the company. If a friend asks me where I got a shirt that looks crappy on me, and I tell them, its not likely that they will want to shop there. How many women in the history of ever run out to buy clothes that make them look dumpy, lumpy and matronly? The answer is zero, excepting schoolmarms and nuns.
Look at the grey shirt above, then compare to this:
My bust looks higher, and its just so much more flattering, right? These are the shirt styles I want. These are the shirt styles that I can’t get. The v doesn’t even need to be that deep. Any v is better than a crewneck.
So, yeah, theres that. And fatter people have similar issues. There are so many roly poly folk out there who actually really like gaming and pop culture. A lot of them would buy if there was something in their size, but there isnt, so they dont. Seriously, no guy that wears a 4x will say “gee, they dont have that, so ill just get an xl and hope for the best.” Again, the dollars of a fat person spend just the same as the dollars of a thinner person, but many daily sites seem to be ignoring those dollars.
Why is this happening? Daily tee sites are not exclusive boutiques and their target demographic is not the Rachel Zoes of the world. Or maybe that is the target demographic….but that would be a very foolish business choice, especially considering that more Americans are overweight or obese than ever before.
Before anyone whines about the vastly increased costs of clothing us bigger folk, I am fully and completely aware that a 4x costs more than a sm. You know, people who wear the 4x are aware of that too…and they are aware that plus sizing is usually managed by adding an additional $2 or so dollars, which is still a very good deal considering the total will be $12 instead of the normal $10.
TL;DR on that one. If a shirt site wants a bigger piece of the pie, they’d do well to include people who like bigger pieces of pie. Mmmmmmm, pie.
So yeah. Im not sure where Im going with this, but Im annoyed. Johnny Rotten has a print tonight that I love, and but I would look like crap, so, instead of spending 10 or 12, I spend 0 and am sad. There has to be a better way, doesnt there?
ninevoltcandy 