I went looking for plus size clothes at Zara, H&M, Uniqlo stores in NCR and found none
Brands like Zara, H&M, Uniqlo or Mango that are trying to be ‘body positive’ and are coming up with campaigns. Photo: dailyO
In a viral video which has now crossed over 7 million views, influencer Diksha Singhi, who has been an advocate for body positivity, called out brands for making life difficult for plus-size women. She claimed that they don’t keep plus-size clothes in their stores.
See the video for yourself:
Diksha was talking about the H&M store at Ambience Mall in Vasant Kunj, Delhi, one of the capital's prime malls.
Nevertheless, this is not the case with just one brand or mall; the inclusion of plus-size women's clothes is solely for the sake of ads and campaigns to make their companies appear better.
In the video, Diksha was sharing her experience and feelings, which is not new to her while she goes out shopping. However, she says that the only change she sees is more brands with plus-size models on their websites.
Today, we do a lot of brands like Zara, H&M, Uniqlo or Mango that are trying to be ‘body positive’ and are coming up with campaigns, like Zara’s 2017 ‘Love Your Curves’ campaign or H&M’s 2016 ‘featuring plus size models in swimsuits’ one. Ironically in 2023, they don't have clothes for plus-sized women in their stores.
The relationship with brands has always been difficult for women who do not fit into the stereotype of the perfect size.
Diksha told dailyO that she had to pretend that she didn't like wear those bodycon dresses or anything that would define her curves, since she had no other option. Why? She could never find her size in stores, and the only section that would have clothes in her size, had baggy T-shirts and loose-fitted pants.
10-15 years later, she does get dresses of her size, though not all the time. For this to happen, she credits homegrown brands who are size inclusive, despite having a percentage of the budget the big fashion brands do.
Why brands don’t keep plus-size clothes offline
After the conversation with Diksha, I went to check things for myself. I went visiting the big fashion brands at DLF Mall of India, Noida, and no surprise - clothes, especially, body-hugging clothes, were far from plus sizes. The size range was Small, Medium, Extra Small, and if you are lucky, you could get Large or XL and very rarely you could spot an XXL.
Dresses are the worst
Since it is the month of February, the Valentine's month, there were a lot of brands that had a collection of corset or bodycon dresses, coloured in red. However, to our surprise, we weren't even able to find a dress in Medium, let alone L or XXL.
We also spoke to managers of these brands to understand why the exclusivity and the response we got was... well, see for yourself: