We need a prime meridian for clothing measurements. . . . .

Years ago, longitude and latitude were calculated on the basis of the observer’s meridian, which might be Paris, Rome. . . .or London. You can imagine the confusion. Then, as of 1851, the prime meridian was established at Greenwich. Not without much debate, but that's another story.

In clothing (just as in geographical coordinates), numbers can be confusing and misleading. Here, small ranges from very, very small to large and boxy . . . .


In clothing, we need a prime meridian!

My closet is filled with cast-offs from family and friends, often from a rushed shopping expedition where they avoided the fitting rooms (after all, a size XS, S, M or L should be a no brainer, right?). Or the items sit in their packaging waiting to be returned. They are found a year later along with the Christmas paper or overdue library books and sales receipt, a reminder that purchases must be returned in 30 days.

In addition to cast-offs, my closet also has clothing from internet shopping—those irresistible final sale items from JCrew or Bebe, those Ebay purchases, custom-made tango shoes from Buenos Aires. All these items are waiting for a new home (either with friends or at a thrift shop) because they never fit me.

Sizes are inconsistent between styles and brands. Part of the problem might be the vanity sizes. As the overall girth of customers increases, clothing sizes decrease. What used to be a size 10 might be a 4 or 6 today. Then there is the problem of on-line shopping and returns. The sizing problem contributes to the high rate of returns (e.g., Zappos has an estimated 35-percent return rate).

While some companies propose high-tech methods (a body scanner to take your measurements and provide you with size equivalents in certain brands), the most cost-effective solution is for both manufacturers and customers to have measurements made with the most basic of all technology, a tape measure, as Farhad Manjoo wrote in his post, “Can Amazon Figure Out How to Sell Clothes that Fit?” It’s time consuming but you only have to do it once.

The advantage of a prime meridian in clothing will be the decrease in returns and increase in customer satisfaction. But the flipside is that the number of cast-offs I receive (or share) will decrease astronomically.