Number's up for Aus sizing

MELBOURNE: Australia's fashion industry is at risk of being marginalised after red tape halted funding for a national sizing survey.

The Size Oz survey - conceived by industry group Sizing Consortium of Australia Landmark Evaluation (SCALE) in 2006 - proposed using the latest tools in 3D body scanning to create accurate sampling techniques.

But having received $6600 from the Victorian Government to create a tender, the $300,000 to complete a pilot has since been stymied by what the project's organisers have slammed as "structural inflexibilities" in the Government's Strategic Investment Program (SIP).

Jo Kellock, the president of project founder the Fashion Technicians' Association of Australia (FTAA), said the current funding crisis was  "very disappointing" as sizing went directly to the issue of sales. "This was the first time that industry was united on this; we had the FTAA, the TFIA [Council of Textile and Fashion Industries of Australia] Standards Australia and several major retailers [on board]."

Kellock said unless alternative funding could be sourced, Australia would lag behind global economies Japan, China, Korea and Mexico - which had plans to profile their populations - and Europe, which was implementing the CEN [Comité Européen de Normalisation or European Committee for Standardisation] system.

"When CEN comes in it will mean swing tags and labels will have to comply. How will our products be able to compete globally?"

With a 1920s Berlei survey and a 1970s study by Women's Weekly magazine now redundant, incorrect sizing particularly affected womenswear and corporate apparel - the latter due to a lack of direct interface with end users, she said.

Daisy Veitch, SCALE advisor and founder of mannequin and fit research company Sharp Dummies, described Australian sizing as "a mess". An estimated 50 per cent of women were forced to buy outside their age demographic because of sizing, while brands had developed their own systems, she said.

Womenswear brand Feathers' designer Lanette Porritt - who confessed to being "pretty shocked" upon realising there was no standard when she joined the company four years ago - has since created one based on Feathers' target customer.

Natalie Wakeling, founder of plus-size denim brand Embody, had done the same, claiming "vanity sizing" - which involves downscaling the real size to cater to consumer egos - had confused consumers.
SCALE advisor Kate Kennedy - who is researching 3D body scanning under an International Specialist Skills (ISS) Fellowship - said sizing was increasingly a cultural and marketing issue, with systems varying widely between markets and retailers ignoring the discrepancies.

"There is certainly an argument now that goes: 'identify your target market and get over it'," Kennedy said.
However the lack of a standard had given rise to unacceptable discrepancies within the same label, Kellock maintained. While industry representatives including the TFIA - which was unavailable for comment as Ragtrader went to press - had unsuccessfully lobbied the Federal Government to re-structure the SIP, she hoped funding could still be found.

"If we could have $50,000 to hire a project manager that would be a start. We have worked on this voluntarily for over two years; that's how important it is."

By Belinda Smart