This post by Michelle, a long time forum member and experienced journalist, kicks off a new effort to dig into the context of fashion and style on a more regular basis. We think it’s a fascinating industry and we hope you enjoy hearing more about it.

The warnings started trickling in during the fall of 2010, then came in a torrent as shoppers prepared to usher in the new year. We fashionistas need not be in a hurry to welcome 2011, analysts warned, since the year would bring price hikes the likes of which hadn’t been seen for more than a decade. In the past few weeks, retailer after retailer confirmed the rumours were true — clothing and footwear prices would be on the rise.

Apparel companies were forced to make the tough decisions after being squeezed by rising commodity prices, they said. Businesses in all industries are often subjected to the merciless whims of the global oil market, which can fluctuate wildly and produce huge swings in the cost of transportation and other workaday corporate needs. The pending price hike, however, has more to do with the price of cotton.

Soaring demand from China, the world’s largest cotton importer, coupled with bad weather in some of the world’s key cotton-producing regions, has sent prices skyrocketing for one of the fashion industry’s staple materials. The cost of the crop has nearly doubled in the past year and reached an all-time trading high of about $2.20 per pound on March 7.

Floods in India and Pakistan put a dent in the world’s cotton supply, analysts said, adding the political turmoil in the Middle East is likely to hamper access to alternative cotton sources and keep prices volatile.

Retailers have bowed to the inevitable and made the pending price hikes official in the past few weeks. Even as apparel giants like Gap Inc. and Nordstrom Inc. announced solid earnings for their most recent fiscal quarters, they didn’t try to sugar-coat what’s in store for their customers. Gap chief executive Glen Murphy specifically cited cotton and petroleum prices when explaining that prices were heading up for the coming season.

“We have to acknowledge the fact that there’s going to be inflationary pressures, not just for ourselves, but for everybody else,” Murphy said in the company’s fourth quarter earnings call.

Executives at Nordstrom were sending out a similar message and hinting obliquely at a strategy that other manufacturers are being more open about. Analysts predict that companies who aren’t willing to pass rising costs on to their customers will have to rely on synthetic fibers to lessen the pressure on their bottom line, and Pete Nordstrom, the company’s president of merchandising, hinted that may well be in the cards for the retailer’s in-house brands.

“I think everyone is looking at a lot of the same issues about prices appearing to be going up,” he said. “The degree to which we have any control over that is really only through the products that we source and design ourselves. And I can tell you in that end, there’s a lot of effort that’s been going on now for several months about diversification strategies in different places where we source goods, and have good manufacturers that will help mitigate some of the risk around rising prices.”

Neither Murphy nor Nordstrom would speculate on how steep the price hikes may be, but industry analysts seem to have reached a consensus estimate of about five per cent.  It’s a drastic change from the past decade, when clothing and footwear prices bucked broader retail trends and actually dropped significantly. The American Apparel and Footwear Association has previously reported that clothing prices dipped 10 per cent between 1998 and 2008. Prices for shoes slipped four per cent during the same 10-year period, a surprising feat considering overall retail prices surged 28 per cent over that time. Retailers’ efforts to combat the global recession also made the past three years an especially bountiful time for bargain hunters as stores put items on discount earlier and more often, it said.

It’s not all doom and gloom for the avid spring shoppers among us. Footwear fanatics may not feel the pinch as we stock up for the season, since leather costs have stayed comparatively stable. Industry heavyweights like Steven Madden Ltd. Are trying to keep prices in check by finding manufacturing locations with lower labour costs, according to Business Week. And some analysts are going so far as to say the price hike will be short-lived.

Sharon Johnson, a cotton analyst with First Capital Group in Atlanta, told the International Business Times that customers could start catching price breaks again as early as this fall.

“The high prices will cure themselves,” she said. “We’re only in mid-season right now for cotton crops. Weather permitting, we should see a record cotton crop this year, and mills should start lowering their prices.”

Michelle McQuigge is a Toronto-based journalist working as a reporter and editor at The Canadian Press.  You can follow her on Twitter.

If you had to choose one colour that’s your absolute worst, either on your own skin colour or just in general – what would it be? I’m going with soul-sucking beige. The description of this colour by one of our forum members as “soul-sucking” has stuck in my brain because it’s SO spot on. Soul-sucking beige is not ivory, tan or camel, but a far less rich shade of light-ish beige that has a cold grey tinge to it.

That being said, soul-sucking beige can occasionally look nice on a dark skin tone, or when the fabric is textured, shiny or iridescent, or when it’s worn together with a high contrasting colour like black. But for the most part I think beige looks lifeless and flat against most skin tones. I look worse than death warmed up when I wear soul-sucking beige.

Of course, this is a very subjective opinion. I also know people who like this shade of beige! It’s fun to hear your views on the subject so over to you. What’s your worst colour in the world?

Sizes XS and S (sizes 0 to 4 in the US) are surprisingly fast selling sizes. More often than not, soon after a sale starts the smallest sizes are in short supply or no longer available, and sale racks are full of sizes M and L. This doesn’t make sense, when the most bought shopping sizes* are usually between an American size 6 and 10. Logically, those are the sizes that should sell out first. Why is this not the case? The reason is quite logical and it takes me back to my fashion buying days – fashion buyers deliberately understock the smallest sizes.

Fashion Buyers are responsible for selecting the items and sizes that sell in a store. They will order in a style from a manufacturer over a very carefully distributed size curve. When they place the order it makes sense to order more of the sizes that are popular, and fewer of the other sizes. So for example, buyers bulk up the order in sizes 6 to 10 because those are the most shopped sizes. That way the store can make the most profit AND offer the most correct size to their customers.

The thing is that they don’t create the size curve to exactly match the popularity of sizes. They order a little less of the unpopular sizes and a little more of the popular sizes. To understand why they do this, consider what happens in practice:

A clothing order hits stores with a full complement of sizes. As the style is purchased, fewer of the sizes become available thereby adjusting the size curve. Because the smaller sizes are intentionally under stocked, they sell out faster than larger sizes (of which there is often two to three times as much quantity). Retailers are happier to sit with an over stocked set of larger sizes than smaller sizes because as time passes by, they have a better chance of selling the larger sizes at any price (full or discounted). Since the most bought shopping sizes are larger than an XS or S, holding surpluses of the larger sizes is less risky at any time of the year.

The bottom line is that they know that their size curve is somewhat of a guess. And they would prefer to err on the low side for less popular sizes and on the high side for more popular sizes. First, one extra item in a popular size is easier to sell, and second, even if they don’t sell it a popular size is easier to sell on down the value chain to a discounter.

That’s why places like TJ Maxx and the Rack are full of size M and L, and sizes 6 to 10. That’s why the smallest sizes are the first to go at Nordstrom Anniversary Sale time. Ever wonder why many thrift and consignment stores are full of sizes 6 to 10? Now you know.

*Note: The most shopped clothing sizes in the US are NOT the same as the average clothing sizes of American women. They are, in fact, a different set of sizes. The average clothing sizes of American women are 12 and 14, yet the most shopped sizes are smaller than that. A topic for another day!

It gives me great pleasure to introduce today’s post by long time forum member, Sarah (who I refer to as TexasSarah because we have several Sarahs on YLF). Sarah’s weight loss and style journey are an absolute inspiration to us all. Her powerful story reflects on her years of soul searching, which have resulted in a killer sense of personal style, a positive body image, and more importantly – a very happy heart. It’s clear that Sarah is a beautiful person both inside and out.

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I’ve always loved fashion. There is little more I enjoy than the fun and boost to my confidence of putting together a successfully fabulous outfit that presents me at my best. I haven’t always felt this way…in fact, my beginnings were mostly filled with fear, frustration, insecurity, even depression.

I always knew I wanted to be confident and fabulous, but there was a disconnect between my desires and the ability to actually make them happen. My childhood and teen years of being the “big-boned” chunky girl set the stage for intense insecurity about my body image, and I ended up an early 20-something, trapped in a box of labels and limitations. I didn’t know I could be anything better than what fate had dealt me, which I believed to be the worst combination of flaws and imperfections any one girl could throw at a wardrobe. I had stacks of fashion magazines dog-eared with fabulous outfit inspirations and in the next room a closet full of nothing to wear.

This disbelief in me wasn’t a conscious choice, it was just my reality. I’d grown to reject who I was, and accepted that there were no alternatives. Why try to be me? “Me” was no good. So instead I’d copy people I admired or celebrities I wanted to be, via what they wore. But my unhappiness and insecurity in my own skin was a poison that left unchecked, promoted damaging and unhealthy habits, both inside and out.

It was at this point in my life that I hit a speed bump, and it jarred me all the way to my core. I’d trashed the inside of my body to the point where it was rejecting itself, and I underwent an emergency surgery to remove my gall bladder. At age 26, this was a serious wakeup call back to reality that forced me to take a hard, honest look at things. My introspection resulted in a brand new outlook. I decided that I was going to live the rest of my life as Sarah, and start learning to live it the best I could. My life was mine for the taking, and I was done living passively, letting negativity and lies boss me around.

The five years since my surgery have been a nonstop journey toward retraining healthy patterns in my daily life, but I can tell you every step – both up and down – has been worth it. I realized that the body I now accepted was worth taking care of, and through encouragement and education, I learned to eat right and exercise. I accepted that Sarah is valuable and a person to be appreciated, which helped me start treating her that way.

Enter Angie and YouLookFab. I was nervous to post outfit photos on the forum initially, but once I did, I was overwhelmed with acceptance and support. I realized that Angie and the other forum members saw me as someone with great potential, not as the scary, ugly, monster I’d always seen. This outside affirmation was so healing! I learned valuable tips and tricks for my body type and lifestyle, and I was encouraged to discover my personal style in a way I’d never allowed myself to do. This “permission” opened up a new world to me, and I was suddenly free to embrace the real me.

The environment of the YLF community gave me confidence for the next baby step, and the next one, and the one after that, and I gradually bloomed into the person I am today. I see now that I had been the one holding myself back all these years. Life isn’t about arriving at a destination, it’s about a journey. It’s not about being “right”, it’s about being YOU.

Not to say there weren’t struggles along the way. Even today, there are times when my mind’s eye sees nothing but distorted images of me. In these moments though, I have to remind myself that this is indeed a process, I’ve worked very hard to be where I am, and I need to trust those around me who see me for who I really am. If I don’t accept and support me from the inside out, I will never be confident regardless of how fit I am or what is hanging in my closet.

I’ve chosen to surround myself with positive influences, which I found through YLF, good friends, family, and healthy eating and exercise. The 75lb weight loss and closet full of pretty things are just the outward signs of an inward transformation. I am finally the person I’ve always wanted to be. Not a perfect style icon, but someone who is full of confidence inside and out, learning to accept where I am at the moment and who I can become in the future.

You can be what you want to be, but it all starts with you. Don’t sell yourself short of your potential. I’m rooting for you!

Stop by Sarah’s style blog the Daily Sophisticate where you’ll see Sarah successfully work a simple, chic and polished look to perfection. Sarah is quite the style icon at YLF and sports perfect pant lengths like no other!