Brandy Melville has been a present force in the fashion industry since it opened its first location in the United States in 2009. It seems to be ahead of the trend curve for teenage girls and always carries styles that fit and flatter in ways that fast fashion brands such as Forever 21, H&M, and Rue21 never do.
But what is it about Brandy Melville that allows it to have this edge against its competitors? How has this brand been able to set itself apart from others?
The company was founded in the early 1980s by Silvio Marsan and his son, Stephan Marsan. Like most businesses in the 1980s, the brand image started problematically.
Franco Sorgi, the ex-store owner of the first Brandy Melville in Canada, said that Stephan Marson had a very specific vision for the future of the store, one that “overweight or Black customers would ruin the brand’s reputation” if they were to cater to that demographic.
Instead, their image was for the “good-looking rich little girls…the most popular high school girls,” said Marsan.
This idea seemed to translate across the executive board at the beginning of the Brandy Melville trajectory in “Marsan and other executives’ minds. The most beautiful and coolest teenagers were almost all white and thin.”
Some, and likely most, would agree that this is still true for Brandy Melville’s reputation. Most girls that still shop there today are thin, white, young girls, with daddy’s money in their back pocket.
Despite this, the brand has remained a prominent force in the easily accessible fashion industry, but why?
In several interviews, I asked this question to teenage girls unaware of the background of Brandy Melville’s reputation. “I think that they have good basics that are timeless, and lots of cute designs too,” said Faby Finol, a freshman at the University of Houston.
Unlike a lot of fast fashion brands previously listed, Brandy Melville features sustainable basics made 100% of cotton, instead of the polyester that seems to have been standardized in American shopping. When considering the manufacturing of their goods, it is found that a majority of them are made in Europe, more specifically in Italy.
Whereas their competitors rely on Asian countries, such as China and Taiwan, for a considerable amount of their products. This answers the question on the higher price of their goods as well, and enters a “you get what you pay for” ideology for Brandy Melville clothing.
Savannah Randall, a student at Bethel College, says that Brandy Melville caters well to her style routine and offers an alternative to athletic clothing but remains comfortable. “I like brandy because they have cute basics that I like, it also helps me feel a bit more feminine from my usual athletic style of clothing,” said Randall.
Another large part of the Brandy Melville reputation, and what a majority of people know the brand for is their “one size” model. All clothing they carry both in-store and online consists of one size that leaves the impression of ‘fits-most’. When in reality it aligns with the previously stated “thin-white girl” body.
The average Brandy Melville tank top- a basic as suggested as before- has the measurements of 16 inches in length, and 11 inches in the bust, which suggest to be a size small. In contrast, the average American teenage girl has the measurements of a waist size of 32.6, or a size 12 body, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
When considering shopping at Brandy Melville its important to understand the pros and cons as it stands as a brand and corporation.
They make sustainable clothing that is trendy and fashionable and made of good material, the opposite of many fast fashion brands today. However, the brand is problematic in origin, and some of these values have translated to the present day. Moreso, their “one-size” fits almost none presents a dilemma for the tween of today, pushing body image issues on adolescents.