Tomima Talks: How to Find a New Favorite Undergarment
You have your favorites when it comes to lingerie. Unlike most other clothing categories where items are made for just a season, lingerie and underwear manufacturers usually make an item over and over again for many years. It’s what we in the trade call “replenishable styles.” If your favorite is a replenishable style, you get to restock for possibly years without worry. But… all good lingerie favorites eventually come to their end.
What do you do when you discover a favorite lingerie piece of yours is gone? For many, it appears to trigger their grief cycle: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, then acceptance. Fortunately, my crackerjack team of chatters and customer service reps are at the ready to help find a replacement. Also, know that my buying team, too, struggles when they get wind of a popular style being discontinued. They immediately shift into offense; cajoling the manufacturer to keep making it while concurrently negotiating to buy up all their remaining inventory so you, our customers, stay happy for just a little while longer. So, we all feel the pain when the decision is made to discontinue a favorite piece of lingerie.
When you find yourself on the hunt for a new bra, panty, or other lingerie pieces, here are some tips to help you find a replacement. But remember, replacements are like eyebrows; similar, but not identical, with one always being your true favorite.
Finding a Similar Replacement
Timing has a lot to do with how quickly you can find a replacement. The first cue is noticing your favorite suddenly has a sale price – not a sale price while a temporary sale is running – a true marked down price. When you see this, you know it’s going away. This is the best time to stock up if you don’t want to spend the time trying to figure out its future replacement.
The next stage is an item identified as “discontinued.” This is the point where you see what are called “broken sizes” which means when you click on the size drop-down, not all the sizes are showing as available. This is your last opportunity to stock up (if your size is listed). It’s also your last opportunity to compare it to other similar items for a possible replacement. Why? Because once your favorite is sold out, its images, details, and fabric content are removed from the site. So, if you find yourself in this stage, HerRoom can help. On every product page, we display two tabs just below our “Add to Shopping Bag” button. The first tab is labeled “Matching” and the other is “Others Liked.” Matching will include the matching panty if you are looking at a bra or another bra style in the same collection by the same manufacturer. “Others Liked” is where we show you similar items. So, for example, your favorite seamless minimizer bra is discontinued. Click on our “Others Liked” tab and you’ll see other seamless minimizer bras available – even from different manufacturers. This tab is the fastest way for you to find a pool of possible replacements
If you find out too late that your favorite is discontinued, sold out, and no longer displayed on our site, there is still a possible option to finding something similar. Go to our search window and key in your favorite style number. We work closely with all our vendors to learn their replacement suggestions. So, when you do this, our site is designed to serve up those replacement suggestions if available.
Finding a New Favorite
Sometimes we are forced into needing something new, or simply wanting to try something new. For example, you’ve just signed up for kickboxing and must find a sports bra, or your friend is in love with her plunge bra and you want to try one as well. With all the choices available, how do you quickly find the one to try? Here are some ways to find quick answers.
Use our navigation and filters to narrow your search. Then make sure you select “Best Sellers” as your sort option. This will order your results according to what is the most popular. The most popular styles are the best starting point when looking to try something new.
Keep your filtered search from above but change your sort to “Top Reviewed.” If you also included your size in your filtering, you now have in front of you products with the highest customer approval reviews in your size. Another great starting point.
Check out our Undie Award Winners. 2020 marks our 15th anniversary of The Undie Awards – the winners are determined by you, our customers and the Select Awards are chosen by our buying team. The winners each year are the styles receiving the highest votes from our many customers. In fact, voting is going on right now through the end of September for the 2020 winners. Vote now and receive a 10% discount on your next order. But please note, some of our vendors require that they be excluded.
Check out our Hall of Fame Undie Winners. After being an Undie Award winner four times, we retire these styles to our Hall of Fame. These winners are truly the most popular items on our site with most having hundreds of 5-star reviews. I just reviewed the list and am delighted to report that eight of the Hall of Fame Winners go back to our Undie Awards in 2007. So, these are very popular products that you can count on to be around for quite a while.
Why are Favorites Discontinued?
Why did a lingerie item get discontinued? My customer service team hears this question frequently. There are truly many reasons why. The most common is lackluster sales. However, many vendors will decide to stop making a style if they can no longer source the same materials. The Wacoal brand is a great example. They maintain very high exacting standards with all their products. I remember a very popular Wacoal bra was discontinued because they could no longer source the EXACT same lace. Similarly, there was a time when manufacturers would discontinue an item simply because a large department store chain stopped buying a style; the brand would thus stop making it for the rest of us. Import duty cost changes can make a product too expensive to import. A factory can be shut down without notice. Natural disasters destroy a factory and products stop being made. The owner retires and the brand simply goes away. These are just a sampling, but the point is there is usually a very sound reason for a popular lingerie item to be no longer on the market.
The next time you find yourself floundering to replace a favorite or dreading the chore of finding something new for your lingerie wardrobe, don’t fret. It’s easier than it used to be. Just start your search early enough that it doesn’t turn into a last-minute dash and know that the answer is just a few keystrokes away.
A Final Thought…
Twenty years ago, when I went live with HerRoom (and a few years later with HisRoom), my branding inspiration was “His” & “Hers” monogramming on towels, slippers, robes, etc. This is why my site logos always had a monogram feel to them. Well, times have changed, and so has branding. As of today, my sites have new logos, and now HerRoom and HisRoom are “Brand New”. When you get a chance, I hope you will check out our new logos. And, know that this is just the beginning. More newness to both my sites is coming over the next six months as we improve many aspects of our sites to better meet your needs and expectations and hopefully WOW you as well.
Fondly,
Tomima Founder & CEO
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