eVelyn Frison很高兴收到出人意料的邀请，参加今年的奥斯卡奖。她有两到三周的时间来寻找穿着的礼服，并开始节省自己喜欢的风格和设计师 - 祖海尔·穆拉德（Zuhair Murad），珍妮·帕克姆（Jenny Packham），莫妮克·卢里尔（Monique Lhuillier） - 到Pinterest板上。但是，她很快意识到这些礼服的尺寸不在网上，她必须亲自去购物。
so she went to Bergdorf Goodman and Saks Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. “It was kind of nuts. Saks might have had two things. Bergdorf had zero,” she says. At Saks, she had a great experience with one of the store’s personal shoppers, who confirmed that she wasn’t imagining it—there is a gown shortage. When Frison wanted to hold an item for 24 hours, the personal shopper had to make a phone call and get special permission to do so. “She said she couldn’t keep things in stock,” Frison says. (The personal shopper did not respond to an email request for an interview.)
Frison isn’t alone in her experience. Demand is at an all-time high as weddings and other events that were postponed during the pandemic are finally taking place—and people are getting even more dressed up for those events than they were pre-pandemic. “We have been hearing about gown shortages,” says luxury retail and fashion consultant Robert Burke. “Companies did not anticipate how swift the rebound would be. It really has almost been like a roaring twenties situation.”
凯特·莫兰（Kat Moran）说：“我一直在寻找几个月的时间，并感到有些绝望。”凯特·莫兰（Kat Moran）说，她想购买新的东西，以适应她朋友即将举行的黑领带婚礼，该婚礼于去年五月推迟了。她正在与参加任何人的人竞争estimated 2.5 million weddingstaking place this year, the most since 1984. She’s been bookmarking dresses at Bloomingdale’s, Nordstrom, Lulus, and Revolve, only to find a lot of styles are out of stock or must be preordered for a future date. “My whole kind of favorite section on Revolve—half of them are now sold out, or you can preorder . . . and the delivery date is anywhere from April 1 to May 31, and who knows when it will get here,” she says.
大流行引起的供应链挑战也导致礼服短缺，这些挑战继续对广泛的时装公司产生负面影响。埃迪·赫兹曼（Eddie Hertzman），创始人兼总裁采购期刊, which covers the sourcing apparel and textile industry, says he doesn’t see supply chain issues getting better any time soon. The gown category relies on specific production facilities, he says, most likely concentrated in a few regions like China and India.
他说：“当您的需求太多时，您只能拿出一定数量的供应。”“中国具有零容忍[COVID-19]政策，突然之间，港口被关闭了，然后将进一步延迟。”他说，他怀疑市场的低端和高端都会受到这些问题的影响。但是，他还怀疑零售商会毫不犹豫地通过增加更多库存来应对需求，因为他们记得大流行时所遇到的所有库存。
To总裁兼CMO Lana Todorovich称，在未来两年内，Neiman Marcus提高了其对客户的速度和补给速度，Neiman Marcus将在其供应链上投资超过9000万美元。s他补充说，晚礼服的创纪录销量是其流行前的两倍以上，并且该商店“放置了很多再生”以增加供应。她列举了卡罗来纳州埃雷拉，奥斯卡·德拉伦塔，瓦伦蒂诺，纳伊姆·汗，塔尔伯特·鲁霍夫和莫妮克·卢里尔的销售特别好。
There may have been some signs this was coming. Burke, the luxury retail consultant, says the industry saw “an enormous pickup in high heels” around eight months ago, leaving some high-end brands struggling to keep shoes in stock. This could have foreshadowed the current gown shortage. He suggests luxury retailers order extra gowns from locally produced labels, like Oscar de la Renta, Carolina Herrera, or Jonathan Simkhai, and that shoppers either cozy up to personal shoppers in stores who can help them find something or just scour the internet: “I think people are going to have to be resourceful.”
购物者还可以尝试使用租赁跑道等服装租赁网站，该跑道提供了提前四个月预订连衣裙的能力。In anticipation of the current boom, Rent the Runway’s president and COO, Anushka Salinas, said in an email that this year the company plans to grow its special-occasion category by 10% compared to 2019. That increase should pay off, given rentals of black-tie items are reportedly at their highest since the 2018 holiday season—and, according to the company—up 150% from 2021. Rent the Runway also launched a personal styling service: Shoppers are encouraged to send an email request to somethingborrowed@renttherunway.com and, a spokesperson says, they’ll receive “rental recommendations perfectly on point for this season’s ‘more is more’ attitude.”
If shoppers strike out renting, there are also resale sites like TheRealReal, which reports a 78% increase in search demand for gowns and cocktail dresses from 2021, with dresses selling for around $70 more than they did last year. Sasha Skoda, TheRealReal’s head of women’s and fine jewelry, noted in an email that stock comes from consignors, so at least there isn’t a worry about supply chain issues.
如今，购物者可能会幸运的是在亚马逊上幸运的是，这可能不是许多人认为购买正式服装的地方。安妮·奥沙利文（Annie O’Sullivan）说：“我从不从亚马逊买衣服，但他们有库存。”安妮·奥沙利文（Annie O’Sullivan）很难为即将举行的婚礼穿上一些衣服。她在网上和商店购物，并因发现的东西而震惊。
“It’s so weird how there’s either nothing or stuff that isn’t appropriate to wear to a wedding. It’s more like club gear, which is, of course, fine, but I can’t wear that to a church,” O’Sullivan says, noting that she did end up finding a black jumpsuit she liked at Lulus. Her sister, however, will wear a cranberry-colored minidress she bought from Amazon around Christmas. “Usually I’m excited to buy new clothes,” O’Sullivan says. “But it’s like nobody has anything, and it’s so frustrating.”