Dressing smart: a reflection on whether branding matters

When you’re out clothes shopping, you probably base what you buy on price, design and quality, maybe even ethicality. There’s one consideration, though, that often trumps them all: brand. A good label means a good purchase, right? Well, this actually depends on your criteria. Let’s work out how much truth there is to it.

People go for high-quality brands because of the assumptions they have of them. They’re better quality, feel good, and last much longer than own-brand or non-branded items, it is assumed. They’re also considered more ethical in terms of sourcing materials and paying staff. Though it’s hard to say how well-founded these impressions are, these are understandable, practical reasons to buy something, because who doesn’t want their clothes to look good, stay intact and not contribute to child labour exploitation in Bangladesh?

But a problem arises with the aim of ‘looking good’, an inherently subjective description that is very hard to isolate from what everybody else thinks. Clothes are designed to be seen, which means our outfits will unavoidably send a message. When we wear designer brands, this message is of everything the brand society associates with them; they increase our social status, help us gain approval and fit in, plus make us look like we have a lot of money and care about child labour exploitation in Bangladesh. You gotta wear brands to stay on brand.

This is especially frustrating when the assumptions we have about the brands aren’t even true. Though the reputation of designer brands may well originate from their good quality, more often than not there’s little to no difference between a £10 H&M t-shirt and a £50 Tommy Hilfiger one – except you’ll know immediately where the latter came from. Exhibit A for the success of expensive advertising campaigns.

So does this mean branding doesn’t matter? Maybe physically not so much, though since branding, price and quality are so intertwined, it’s hard to thread them apart. In terms of societal acceptance, though, it matters a great deal, because we can’t escape the judgements of other people, and it’s very hard (and actually unnatural) not to be impacted by them. In isolation, paying so much extra for the same thing feels silly, but it’s actually very understandable. Even if fashion is a made-up construct, its effects are very real.