
Photo courtesy of zippycart.com
A big deal was made when Sara Blakely, 41, the creator of Spanx, was named the youngest, female self-made billionaire ever on the Forbes list. Blakely built her empire based on a pair of footless tights she perfected in her Decatur, Ga., apartment.
The company has grown through great word of mouth — recent Oscar winner Octavia Spencer claimed to be wearing three pairs of the shapers at the Golden Globes ceremony this year.
But women have a long history of suffering for beauty – squeezing into girdles, push-up bras and high heels. We’ll torture ourselves if we think it’ll make a dress look better.
Men, however, are known for being proud of their beer bellies, for walking around without shirts, sometimes going “commando.” Yet Spanx for Men debuted in February 2010, following a British line, Equmen, which introduced control undershirts in 2009. Inspired, coincidentally, by Blakely’s creation. The line claims to do for men’s chests what Spanx do for women’s thighs.
According to a May 2010 New York Times article, once control pieces were available for men, they flew off the shelves of stores like Nordstrom and Niemen Marcus.
Which is a nice idea, but who’s buying them? Not the guys who buy their underwear at Kohl’s or Sears – neither of which carry shape wear for men. Sales associates in the men’s departments of said stores at the Rego Park said not only do their stores not carry men’s shapers, men don’t ask for them, either. Read the rest of this entry →