❤ Textile Relationships ❤

Briana Schiro
Aug 27, 2017 · 4 min read

This topic is personal. I know I can get passionate about this, but I bet I’m not alone. Textiles brands have these relationships with consumer brands all the time. If you don’t work in or study textiles, apparel, or design you probably don’t notice when your favorite brand has its name coupled with another brand on the tag of your favorite jeans. If you do notice, you don’t exactly care unless the price goes up. That is until you notice a change in the product after use, whether it be good or bad. We can take a step closer into this specific scenario, and what compromises are necessary for a healthy relationship.

I had a marketing professor in my undergraduate studies who repeated about a hundred times during the semester that every relationship must have three things, trust, respect, and mutual gain. When the two brands decide to work together, they must co-market. For this to work they should trust that both parties will participate, and respect each other to not micro-manage how each goes about doing this. In return, they will both benefit. To help demonstrate co-marketing I’m going to pull from my experiences.

Let’s introduce the brands, Kravet is a textile brand, they work with high clientele and design upholstery, wall coverings, and draperies. They have collections with consumer brands like Ralph Lauren Home and Kate Spade New York. About two years ago, Kravet was about to release their line with Kate Spade New York, so Kravet’s sales representatives held lunch and learns for designers where they laid out the not-yet released designs and provided sandwiches and lemon infused water. This way, designers knew the collection was coming, and were processing how they could use it in their upcoming projects. Kate Spade did what they do best, took to social media, posted sneak peaks of the fabrics, and got every twenty-year-old #basic girl spilling her Starbucks in excitement (myself included). I was privileged enough to witness both marketing ploys. The benefit of this relationship or mutual gain, is that both brands can broaden their audience. Kravet’s audience before Kate Spade was mostly the Baby Boomers and Generation X, but now opened up to the Millennials. Kate Spade who previously was a fashion only icon, now has an audience in home décor.

Another relationship that might relate more to Generation Y is American Eagle jeans, and their recent love of Lycra. This has been a hot topic in my apartment with my roommates, who are buying less of American Eagle. However, I’m not convinced I can ever part with their Soft & Sexy line made with a beautiful rayon-cotton blend. I’ll try and update in a decade when my future-children tell me I’m not allowed to be sexy anymore. As we’ve been on the search for more work-appropriate clothing, and figuring out if jeans are now officially acceptable even when it’s not casual Friday, I, a creature of habit, went to buy jeans without holes in them at the same store I bought the rest of my jeans I’ve been wearing for the past four years, American Eagle. A few things have changed, but we won’t talk about my size. Their women’s jean line has introduced Lycra, thus revealing my somewhat toned thighs I’ve sculptured by the occasional rounds of squats I do in my bedroom. In my everyday life and going out with friends I don’t mind showing off some curves, but for work, I think we should leave a little more to the imagination. In American Eagle’s defense, they never claimed to be a business casual supply store, but I knew their jeans fit my body and thought it’d be easier than to find another store that had jeans I liked.

For me, I wish American Eagle had more options without Lycra, so they could still be my one stop shop for jeans, but now I guess I’ll have to walk across Crabtree and pay $40 more for Express. (It’s probably time to upgrade anyway.) However, my roommate said last night that she loved the new jeans because they don’t get stretched out, and she doesn’t have to worry about ripping them in the morning struggle to pull up skinny jeans, a battle a good number of us know all too well.

I imagine if you clicked to read this post you were slightly interested in textiles to some capacity, or maybe my flashy hearts in the title line got your attention, but textile brands and their interactions with consumer brands 100% have an impact on us, and what we purchase, so in case you didn’t know, maybe now you do.

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