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The United Nations of Uniqlo

economist.com

51–60 of 95 posts

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#51
post #24
post #15

Huge fan of Uniqlo, we're very lucky to have so many of them in London. The clothes tend to be the right side of 'fashionable', ie the cuts are modern and flattering, the price is very comparable with and often better than the other UK high street rivals, and most importantly the quality for the most part far surpasses everything else in the price bracket. It's (generally) far better than buying from Zara or H&M, whi…

I like that there are relatively few models and most of the variations are in colors. I hate shopping for clothes, the lack of choice is a feature for me. I had to buy some shorts the other day, Uniqlo had like three models and 5 colors, I spent less than 5 minutes in the store. And as other people point out in this thread, the quality is in general very decent for this price.

I suggest checking out thread.com if you're in the UK. I've been using them or years and love them.

Each week they suggest "outfits" for you and you can buy them all, bits of them, or none of them (you can ignore the emails). They then send them to you, and you can try them on in your home, and sending them back is super-easy (put them in the box, drop at collect+). They pull from many different other shops and brands.

I promist I don't work for them, I just really love the service :) As someone who also hate clothes shopping it was a revelation.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These deficiencies in Japanese education are self-reinforcing; people who are unaware of these things will not pressure the state to include them in the curriculum. Of course, I'm sure SK doesn't talk much about their greatest moral embarrassments.

In USA public schools the same history course is given ten grades in a row. Somehow it neglects to include anything about Wounded Knee, USA actions in Philippines, Mosaddegh coup, COINTELPRO, School of the Americas, etc.

Definitely didn't cover COINTELPRO but the Philippines and Wounded Knee were definitely covered. We rarely got past 1960 so most of the more recent US actions were uncovered.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#53
I love their long sleeve dress shirts. I have probably every "checked" variety they offer. They hold up great.

I really love their comfort sport coats. Great alternative to a sweater that can be dressed down to wear with denim. Mine always get compliments.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#54
post #6

What H&M had, Zara somewhat still has, but Uniqlo doesnt have is the must buy or might not see it again. Uniqlo does a good business selling decent quality clothes at a decent price that are modern classics.

> What H&M had, Zara somewhat still has, but Uniqlo doesnt have is the must buy or might not see it again.

Uniqlo actually does this too, just in a rather different way. The company tends to make annual revisions to various products, sometimes changing minor things like cutting the shoulders more closely (which may even be mentioned, changelog-style on Uniqlo.com) to completely restyling the garment.

As an example of the latter, I had been thinking about getting one of their mountain parkas last year but decided to wait. The 2020 revision looks very different – fortunately in a way I still liked – but if I’d had my heart set on the 2019 version (or I had an older version that I needed to replace), I’d have been out of luck.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#55
post #39

The problem with wearing uniqlo in japan, is you will always pass someone wearing the same things as you.

To be fair, the mainstream Japanese style, especially in large cities where most of the workforce gather in offices, does not leave much room for differentiation.

Something that has always fascinated me, though, is the irony of Japan being one of the leaders in street and urban fashion.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#56
Uniqlo makes up 80%+ of my "wardrobe".

Minimalist design, good fitting, decent materials, at a very affordable price point.

And I'm also continually impressed by their work on new materials: heat tech, tight "Chino" pants that are stretchy that I can do parkour in.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#57

Love the clothes Hate the work culture. I have a few friends who work for Uniqlo on the e-commerce team in the US. They all tell me that the work culture is horrible. It’s very Japanese. - Long unproductive hours gets your bosses appreciation. - Very sexist and male dominated. - They hate working remote even when it was absolutely necessary for the employee. - No respect for maternity related issues. Any company that…

> Any company that would like to see itself become multinational has to adapt to local cultures

Good luck on that. General consensus out here in Asia is that western people are lazy ( but not everyone feels this way! Some people consider westerners to be lazy and nice..)

Traditional Asian culture, this is my own Non controversial opinion coming, values hard work. A bunch of people I know who work in Science park in Taiwan are actually afraid of being productive because if they were to become more efficient then suddenly they would be working so much more. No managers reward productivity out here with a shorter work day.

If the rest of the world were to mandate four day work weeks by law, and flourish doing such, then the companies out here would rub their hands together greedily because they will dominate with their work culture and punishingly long hours.

So much about Japan is best in the world but their work culture is soul crushing.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#58
post #51
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like that there are relatively few models and most of the variations are in colors. I hate shopping for clothes, the lack of choice is a feature for me. I had to buy some shorts the other day, Uniqlo had like three models and 5 colors, I spent less than 5 minutes in the store. And as other people point out in this thread, the quality is in general very decent for this price.

I suggest checking out thread.com if you're in the UK. I've been using them or years and love them. Each week they suggest "outfits" for you and you can buy them all, bits of them, or none of them (you can ignore the emails). They then send them to you, and you can try them on in your home, and sending them back is super-easy (put them in the box, drop at collect+). They pull from many different other shops and brand…

>I suggest checking out thread.com

Thanks. I just check it out and Really like the idea. Somehow those recommendation dont work for me. But at last it gave me a few useful tips to further look into.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#59
post #15

Huge fan of Uniqlo, we're very lucky to have so many of them in London. The clothes tend to be the right side of 'fashionable', ie the cuts are modern and flattering, the price is very comparable with and often better than the other UK high street rivals, and most importantly the quality for the most part far surpasses everything else in the price bracket. It's (generally) far better than buying from Zara or H&M, whi…

My problem with Uniqlo is that they changes cuttings, Materials and some other minor details all while showing the same label. So they will look 95% the same, even material is pretty much the same.... but it is still "different". ( The Item code will be different ) Not to mention Uniqlo's quality depends on its country of origin or where they are sold. Uniqlo in Japan is really a bar higher than Uniqlo around the world. ( Which is pretty much the same with everything in Japan, domestic products tends to be of the highest quality compared to Export)

So if you are picky about these sort of things Uniqlo tends to offer inconsistency.

Re: The United Nations of Uniqlo

#60
post #49

I did some strategy work for a very large UK fashion retailer who's at the complete opposite end of the "don't chase fashion" market. Everyone in that industry is trying to emulate Uniqlo's margins and unit economics. This article talks about how they produce their fabric, but the thing they realised super early is how valuable _vertical integration_ can be in fashion retail. They own the end to end process, from raw…

Where I could read up more on it? Or are these sort of insider knowledge? ( If so, if you dont mind expand on it in a bit more detail )
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