May 19, 2008
NOTHING COSTS MORE... (via Kurt Brouwer)
Is This the World’s Cheapest Dress? (ERIC WILSON, 5/01/08, NY Times)
IF rock purists were unsettled last month by the opening of a designer boutique on the site of what once was CBGB, the hard-core Bowery nightclub, imagine how they will feel reading the next sentence: The old Tower Records space a few blocks away on Broadway, for two decades the spot for adolescent reveries of dance, pop and punk, has been leased by Steve & Barry’s, a clothing chain where everything costs less than $10.Posted by Orrin Judd at May 19, 2008 5:46 PMSteve & Barry’s, for the uninitiated, is to fashion what Tower once was to music. Steve & Barry’s is manna, a store that sells stylish celebrity-branded clothes at prices that are absurdly inexpensive, lower than those at Old Navy, H & M or Forever 21, undercutting even Wal-Mart by as much as half.
At its 264 barnlike stores in malls across the country, including the perpetually mobbed one at the Manhattan Mall in Midtown, Steve & Barry’s offers an assortment of flowery sundresses designed by Sarah Jessica Parker ($8.98), heart-printed hoodies by the Nickelodeon alumna Amanda Bynes ($8.98) and basketball shoes by the New York Knicks point guard Stephon Marbury ($8.98). Lines at the registers are often 20 deep.
Last year, I bought 4 polo shirts @$7.99 apiece and 2 khaki shorts @8.99 apiece at Steve&Barry's. I still have one pair of the shorts and all of the polo shirts; the quality is that good. So good, I bought three more pairs of shorts at the SAME price. Which says nothing about all the college logo gear the place has.
I can't recommend the place enough.
Posted by: Brad S at May 19, 2008 8:18 PMI don't need 4 more polo shirts. How many polo shirts can a married guy living in the Chicago area wear?
So clothes are cheap. BFD! With around 50% of the world's population living on $2.00 a day, this is supposed to be a surprise?
OTOH, I just paid $4.15 for a gallon of gas, and my property taxes in corrupt Cook County just skyrocketed so a bunch of worthless educrats and substandard teacher's union drones could retire rich.
When something I actually need gets cheaper, you guys tell me.
Posted by: Bruno at May 20, 2008 12:39 AMClothes are a basic human need. Driving yourself everywhere is why there's an obesity problem.
Posted by: oj at May 20, 2008 6:05 AM"Clothes are a basic human need." Amen to that! Especially if they are cute. ;)
And, of course, the superfantastic shoes!