This Store Combined Its Plus-Size Section With Its Main Line

Online retailer ModCloth, perhaps best known for its cutesy patterned frocks, has decided to nix its separate section for plus-size garb. Instead, shoppers will be able to peruse sizes XS through 4XL in one place. The decision was spurred by feedback ModCloth gathered through an inclusivity survey of its customers sizes 16 and up: More than half of those surveyed were averse to the term "plus size," and 79% of respondents said "that the fashion industry ignores the needs of 'Plus' women," according to a ModCloth representative. Customers' positive reactions to seeing 95% of the company's merch available in such an inclusive range of sizes at the brand's pop-up shops in L.A. and San Francisco also prompted the e-tailer to get rid of its separate merchandizing. "I think there is still an outdated notion in the [fashion] industry that ‘plus’ should be separate because it’s less aspirational, or because that consumer is less fashion-forward, or less willing to spend on herself,” ModCloth founder Susan Gregg Koger wrote today on ModCloth's blog. “But what we’re hearing and seeing from our community is that it is simply not true." ModCloth isn't the first to come up with this more expansive approach to sizing in retail. The brand is joining an industry-wide conversation to ditch the tired practice of siloing plus-size merch to its own separate area (whether that's online or in a brick-and-mortar store) that's been getting louder in recent months. In August, Melissa McCarthy spoke to Refinery29 about her issues with the term "plus-size," and why she was adamant about her Melissa McCarthy Seven7 line being carried in sizes 4 through 28. There's also #DropThePlus, a hashtag-driven movement that was rolled out on social media earlier this year by Australian model Stefania Ferrario. However, #DropThePlus has its detractors, since Ferrario is a U.S. size 8, which may place her beyond the traditional physical specs of a runway model but doesn't qualify her as plus-size. But any move toward a more inclusive shopping experience is a good thing — and this one doesn't actually seem like all that radical a change at all.