NEW YORK — Stores are trying everything they can think of to disguise the fact that you’re going to pay more for clothes this fall.
Some are using less fabric and calling it the new look. Others are adding cheap stitching and trumpeting it as a redesign.
Retailers are raising prices on merchandise an average of 10 percent across-the-board this fall in an effort to offset their rising costs for materials and labor. But merchants are worried that cash-strapped customers who are weighed down by economic woes will balk at price hikes. So, retailers are trying to raise prices without tipping off unsuspecting customers.
“Let the consumer trickery begin,” said Brian Sozzi, Wall Street Strategies’ retail analyst.
The new strategies come as merchants’ production and labor costs are expected to rise 10 percent to 20 percent in the second half of the year after having stayed low for years.
Teen retailer Abercrombie & Fitch is advertising “Redesigned 2012” jean collection in its stores and on its website, touting that the jeans are “softer, with the perfect amount of stretch.” They’re also mostly priced between $78 and $88, about $10 more than last year, according to Jennifer Black, who heads research firm Jennifer Black & Associates.
Sozzi, the analyst, examined the jeans and believes they are “thinner” and of “cheaper quality.” That extra stretch, he says, simply could mean the retailer is saving by using less denim.
Eric Cerny, an Abercrombie & Fitch spokesman, declined to comment. But Cerny reiterated what executives told investors in recent months: the bulk of increases on items will start to happen in September and the chain will not sacrifice quality to achieve cost reductions.
