Whatever happened to some bottom dollar but popular
fashion names of my youth?
That means, for me, those
ever so crucial years of scoping out fashion trends from teen magazines and
weekend mall-hopping with my mother and besties fell during the early 2000’s.
My favorite mall stores in
2003 and 2004 and beyond still exist today. The early 2000’s were part of the
heyday of preppy teen fashions like polo shirts, low rise boot-cut jeans with
“bedazzling”, shirts with brand names in bold across the chest and overpriced
colorful leather flip-flops. At least, that’s what was king in Florida at the
time. The “cool kids” (AKA the rich
crowd with no rules) donned Hollister hoodies, LaCoste Polo shirts, Abercrombie
and Fitch Jeans that were so low they bared the entire midriff and American
Eagle graphic tees. Each tee had a secret hidden adult message in its image,
like an ad for a fictitious Laundromat that said “Drop your shorts here”.
As one of the more oddball
children in my class, I was not wealthy enough to drop hundreds at these stores
each month nor was I permitted to wear clothes that would have basically made
me into a walking sexual innuendo. Still, despite all the odds, my favorite brands
were Hollister and American Eagle in those days. I would buy it second hand,
accept the hand-me-downs from my next-door neighbor who WAS one of “the cool
kids” and shop the clearance sales. My mom would filter the content and require
that I wear colorful layering tank-tops, also a trend at the time, under the
crop tops that didn’t leave enough to the imagination. (That’s right. Crop tops
aren’t just something that’s become popular since the late 2010’s.) Both stores
still exist to this day, as well as Abercrombie and Fitch and LaCoste, but most
of them have had to re-brand at least once. Some have gone through financial
hardship, and all but LaCoste have had to adopt and adapt the “hipster” look
that became huge for the youth of the late 2010’s. Form-fitting polos in bright
pink (for BOTH men and women) have been replaced by loose-fitting, over-sized
black “cozy” sweaters, grunge plaid and purposeful tears.
Since I was NOT one of the
wealthy “it” crowd, and my parents did shop on a budget, I also got acquainted
with some lower-end but still cute names in fashion. My mother always preached
“quality over quantity” but sometimes I would indulge these made-in-China
knockoffs of the most popular styles for teenage girls. Around that time,
Forever 21 was starting to rise to fame. In my area. It might have already been
popular in bigger cities but in my neck of the woods in central Florida, it
didn’t exist. To have a shopping spree at the gigantic low-cost fashion
retailer, one would have to trek 45 minutes to a very classy upscale mall in
Orlando. Once I moved to an area south of Jacksonville, I had to make a trek to
one of two not-so-upscale malls to go to a mini version of this store, until
the two-story one opened in an old Belk space at the closer of the two malls.
Forever 21 still exists to this day, but is falling into some hard times. And
the quality gets cheaper every year.
But what about some of the
other names? The names that were very common at that time, but that you never
see now? Models in Seventeen would be wearing cute outfits with at least one
piece being from one of these stores. My friends would want to go to these
stores on our girls-day-out, because most of the time, we didn’t have $100
between us. These stores were in every mall and sometimes the large strip malls
in the area.
Welcome to “Whatever Happened To...”
#1: 5-7-9
This low-cost fashion
retailer was created in the 80’s to cater to young women that were three of the
most common sizes in America at the time. It neither catered to emaciated girls
nor curvy ones.
Today it has evolved to offer
sizes for all body types, from petite to plus. Most of the stores have closed,
but the ones that still exist seem to be owned by Rainbow. These two companies
were intertwined.
I only saw the stores in the
malls of bigger cities than mine, like Tampa and Orlando. I frequently saw an
article of clothing from the store on a model when I would paw through
Seventeen or one of the other teen magazines for outfit ideas. The girl would
be wearing an outfit with a theme, like “spring weekend” and her cute jacket
worn over her floral, flowy top would advertise as being from 5-7-9. I don’t
think I personally ever shopped there, though.
#2: DOTS
If Forever 21 was lower-cost
fashion, DOTS was bargain-bin fashion. We’re talking about the types of clothes
that start to unravel or fade within a few washes. Still, I would happily join
my girlfriends in burrowing through those bargain racks on a Saturday to find
essentials like tanks and tees for only $3.
The DOTS store in my town was
located in the largest strip mall on the Southside at that time. This strip
included a movie theater and three discount “department stores”: Marshall’s,
Ross and Stein Mart. A larger outdoor shopping center has since been built, and
while all three of those stores are still there, the movie theater is now Hobby
Lobby. DOTS has been extinct for at least a decade.
DOTS filed for Chapter 11
bankruptcy in 2014 and closed all 360 of its stores since then.
#3: Gadzooks
This store was fun. Every
location contained half of a classic Volkswagen Beetle, either coming out of
the wall or attached to a display table. This store also seemed to channel
remnants of 90’s “Rave Culture” well into the 2000’s. I was too young to be
part of that, but I liked some of the looks, especially the resurfacing of 60’s
“flower child” style. I remember being fourteen or fifteen and finding huge
platform sandals, bell-bottomed jeans and colorful tops that looked like party
clothes to me.
Gadzooks, like 5-7-9, had
also been created in the 1980’s. It was originally just meant for T-shirts.
Where they went wrong was when they reduced the merchandise to only women’s in
2003, they ran some backwards-seeming ads that went against the feminist
culture that’s been slowly rising up in America since around that time. Later
on, they would have to file bankruptcy twice. Forever 21 Purchased many of the
stores as the brand went defunct.
I actually remember this
merger. It was in the late 2000’s. I lived south of Metro Jacksonville by then.
There was a tiny Gadzooks store in the mall closest to me that informed me one
day that Forever 21 was buying them out. I was happy... I loved Forever 21! The
tiny store received its Forever 21 logo above the door. Then, Forever 21 rented
out a huge two-story space in the mall and that store closed to merge into the
larger one.
#4: Anchor Blue
This one was not on my radar
for most of my youth. In fact, it didn’t even exist in my area at all until (I
think) after I left that town to go to college. Somewhere in that time frame,
an Anchor store opened up in the mall in my hometown. I still would not have
known about it, if it weren’t for a boy I dated in my senior year of high
school. While he liked more gothic-seeming attire, His younger sister and her
friends adored Anchor Blue. They had gotten familiar with it during the few
short years he and his family lived in Arizona. They talked about it more than
once, which made me curious.
During one visit home while I
was in college, most likely one of the two summers I went back, I went for a
walk through the Anchor Blue store that had opened up in the mall there. To be
honest, it wasn’t anything special to me. I saw a collection of jeans that were
mostly embellished on the back pockets. This was popular in the mid-2000’s. I
also saw a wide selection of graphic tees with either band references or
comical content, and some short dresses and other popular teen fashions for
that time. To me, it looked like a mash-up of Hot Topic’s graphics minus the “goth”,
Don Ed Hardy jean knockoffs, Forever 21’s skirts and dresses, and all of it
Beall’s Outlet quality at American Eagle prices. I’ll be honest: these friends I used to have
talked it up so much, I was actually kind of looking forward to it. Then when I
arrived, I was disappointed. I don’t even remember if I bought something or
just kept window-shopping.
If that was around 2006 or
2007, its run was short-lived. In 2011, the brand filed for bankruptcy and
closed all of its stores.
To be continued...
*I do not own these logos or images
