Season 2, Ep. 10

Abercrombie & Bitch

Ah that wonderful magical world of Abercrombie & Fitch. 

More specifically, the magical wonderful world of the Abercrombie and Fitch stores. Feels like nothing else is going on in the world when you walk in those stores, doesn't it? ISIS, what ISIS? I have a topless male model staring at me here, bothered. 

For those of you who don't probably know what on earth I'm talking about, Abercrombie & Fitch or also known as A&F is an American Retail brand that sells casual, everyday wear across the world and it most certainly has a unique style when it comes to its stores. Now, 80% of the company's stores are located across America, however the rest of them are around Europe and pretty sure there must be one in Aussie somewhere, but you guessed it right, where there's white people, there's a store. Ahem. I'll get to that later. 

The stores are big, poorly lit and with many floors and it plays extremely loud music and usually dance beats. So if this painted a picture of a club to you, you guessed it right, that's pretty much their aim, to make you feel like you're partying while shopping minus the alcohol. True paradise for the shopaholic, if you're not an alcoholic. Hash tag rhyme. But that's not the MAIN signature style of the stores. Nope, as if the darkness and the loud as music are not enough, the sales people who work on the floor are models. Some proper working models, others are unemployed actors and just extremely good looking students. All in all, beauty galore. Uh-huh. Believe me the eye candy is insane. And to add another little cherry on your cream pie, there is usually a ridiculously ripped guy standing topless wearing A&F jeans at the entrance of each store ready to greet you and take a photo with you. A polaroid. A polaroid photo with a topless 6-pack with a head on it. You don't usually see past the pecks that's why I'm objectifying the person so much. What can you do, looks are looks. And Mr M. Jeffreys-look him up- knows that. I'm not sure if he is still the CEO of A&F but he sure was while I worked there. Oh yeah, I was working there for 6 years. 6 whole years, I jumped from department to department, I did the sales person thing, then I did some dancing-oh yeah-on the floor as well, just, you know, some casual bopping while greeting customers, then I did my share of recruiting beautiful models myself to be part of our campaign and London stores,now that was fun and shallow, then I decided I no longer wanted to feel like a carrot so I jumped into more productive roles like work the stockrooms, shipment of stock, some office work etc. All this in London. The store there is mahoosive. 

Mr CEO current or not, has very strong views on his models aka employees' looks, and not only that, he even has strong views on what kind of customers he likes to target. What do I mean by that? He promoted the all-natural look widely. I have no opposition to that, I believe in natural, clean looks too, so basically he wouldn't allow too much make up, coloured hair, tattoos or facial piercings but he was also too strong about his boys being clean shaven. I am using the word boys here because that's unfortunately how most men look clean shaven.

I mean this sounds all fair until the Muslim girl came along for a job and since she is wearing a head scarf she can only get a job at the stockrooms. And then the girl with the prosthetic arm came for a job too and suddenly she is never allowed on the sales floor during opening hours either. Suddenly the employees that are allowed to be seen all look similar, there was nothing special or different about and in one word perfect. Sounds like an

Aryan race case to me, ahem. Now, whether you agree with me here that this sounds a bit ridiculous or not, the two girls along with tens of other employees with a similar A&F treatment from across the world have indeed sued A&F multiple times for this outrageous manhandling. I swear, I'm not lying look it up. Pretty sure the company has spend millions on compensations it says. And to top it all off, Mr CEO has mentioned in interviews, "I don't want to sell my clothes to poor people and I only want my clothes to be worn by beautiful people". Something like that. Hash tag burn baby burn. Between you and me, not worth it. Clothes overpriced and bad quality, trust me I know. 

And yes I worked there. One of my many jobs for this lifetime was this and I may say after the first couple of years where I established a relationship with my managers who by the way were changing every month pretty much, I lost track, things became pretty cruise-y for me. There were times where I would work there full time and there was times I worked there once a month for a year and then back more regularly etc. You can NOT believe how magical that moment was when I handed in my resignation for me. Tears and everything. TOODLES to A&F, Noodles to you.

There is always positives to every experience, and with this one I take away all the hundreds of beautiful souls I met while working there. "C'est tous"

Ta.

K.