Dressing for Success in Challenging Economic Times

By Gregg Weitzenkorn

A. Weitzenkorns & Sons, Inc.

Whether a recession is looming or not, many businesses are experiencing a slowdown, or finding that sales, and profits, require much greater perseverance and margin shrinkage. One easy solution may be as simple as dressing more business like during tougher times. In a challenging economy people want to look their best.

When business is flowing, dress takes a back seat, because it seems as though the more casual dress has little effect on sales, but in slow times you are more likely going against a competitive bidder and possibly multiple sales levels coming in to close a sale. Your appearance can be an easy and quick update.

Not that you must wear a suit for every situation, but your dress and appearance must reflect:

• That you care about your client enough to dress appropriately.

• Respect his position within his company

• Appear confident, trustworthy, and business like, which relates that you can handle the execution of the job.

Besides being influenced by a recession, chains and designers are injecting tailored clothing and dressy sportswear into their stores and lines. It seems the younger man is injecting clean wovens, trousers, and soft sport coats into the mix. J Crew and Banana Republic are giving more space to dressier looks in response to the customer’s evolving tastes.

In the office, the tailored traditional suit still has its cache, but recently tailored clothing is getting a play outside the boardroom, as guys mix and match dressy items with sportswear. For example, you can take a suit and wear it multiple ways to enhance your wardrobe. One way may be as a traditional suit with a shirt and tie, another might be with the suit coat worn over jeans, and the 3^rd might be wearing the suit pants with a woven or knit top. It’s how you mix those elements together that makes it new and interesting.

Dress has become very creative, with the mixing and matching of various items, but as a word of caution, it must be done right or you can look, at best, out of place. This is where your menswear specialty store can advise you on the best and most effective way to pull it off.