consume and embody the clothes that at the same time they are selling and co-constructing

Clerks both wear and sell clothes and are thus walking

advertisements for the store: they consume and embody the clothes that at the same

time they are selling and co-constructing. Thus when staff is hired shops look for

“fashion people”—for people that could add a particular style or attitude to that which

the shop aspired: “You know what they say: Hire for attitude, train for skills” (personal

interview 2005, retailer J). At the same time, as one retailer in our study remarked: “the

sales person must not be cooler than the customer” (personal interview 2005, retailer N).

540 A. Hauge, A. Malmberg & D. Power

5.4. Fashion Media as Information Intermediaries

The general and fashion media’s coverage of different spaces, events, garments, styles and

brands are in several ways vital to the creative processes that in the end constitute fashion

knowledge.Sheath wedding gowns ,

  As a source of information transmission from the industry to the consumer,

media is central in the production of symbolic value (cf. Rantisi, 2004). The connection

between fashion companies and fashion media is often very close and has been described

in terms of mutual understanding and partnership (cf. Tungate, 2005, p. 128):

“[A high profile fashion journalist] is friends with many here. I think part of our

success is that we have natural connections to different journalists. We know

them from before. We know the right music journalist, fashion journalist, etc. But

we cannot make her [the journalist] wear this and that. Then she would not call

us anymore.” (personal interview 2005, PR agent)

Fashion media has a key interpretative role in their reporting on different fashion events:

they filter and interpret the major trends,First Communion gowns ,

  and highlight which designers and brands they

think best capture these trends, etc. However, the critical approach typical of journalists

in their coverage of fields such as music, film, theatre and arts is rare in fashion

(Kawamura, 2005). Rather, articles in the fashion media often take the form of helpful

consumer guidelines (Brown, 1998).

One fashion journalist said that few of her colleagues had formal journalistic backgrounds

but that most have worked in the business: primarily as models, designers or stylists.

With backgrounds in the business, fashion journalists often have close personal ties to

those still within the industry. This is evident in Sweden where several of the informants

pointed to the fact that most journalists and industry people knew one another.

This means fashion journalists have a solid knowledge of the business but there is an

attendant risk of groupthink (cf. Janis, 1982) or lock in. Hence, few believe that fashion

magazines are anything near objective in their reporting and as one informant suggested:

“The fashion magazines are in reality only advertisements for clothing” (personal interview

2005, fashion journalist). Several other informants revealed that the borders

between editorial articles and advertisements are getting even more blurred since advertisers

frequently stress that they also want to be mentioned editorially in the same edition

their adverts appear. It is common to find in magazines an advert for a company, and

then find that the same business is included in a fashion feature such as an article or

that the firm’s clothes are worn by models in editorial photo spreads. In many cases it

can be difficult to tell editorial coverage from advertisements; this may be because the

same people have created both (Aspers, 2001). This is nothing particular to the Swedish

case and can be found in other places’ fashion media (Tungate, 2005).

http://anne468.livejournal.com/8346.html