Phreshly Squeezed

In case you haven’t heard, American Apparel has found itself in deep trouble with its hiring policies and targeted demographics. It started last month when erotic dancer and performer April Flores approached a showroom representative of the company asking if they would ever consider launching a plus-sized line. Flores was met with the response, “That’s not our demographic.” Of course, that alone started a flurry of responses, including one from Lillian Behrendt of My Unacceptable Body, that stated that they not only were big fans of the comfort of the clothes, but were also frequent buyers.

The greater issue that has surfaced within the past several days deals with and examines the hiring policies of American Apparel. Albeit, the company has already been accused of having the policy of letting go of employees that were deemed too ugly. But now, they’re facing fire of how you even get to work for the LA based company. What Gawker has learned and obtained from an internal transcript is that job applicants have their photos taken, which are then assessed by a nameless person for hiring. Adding to such, employees receive $100 incentives for their recruitment, but have to send the pictures through their personal email account, and not the store’s account. And of course, American Apparel asserts that they are screening candidates so as to make sure that they do not hire those that are considered to be “off-brand.” But really, how can you be off-brand if you are wearing a tee and a pair of pants when having your photo taken so that they can be sure of you eye and hair color, and figure?

The interal transcript from May 18th regarding hiring procedures for American Apparel

The scrutinizing and “rigorous” hiring process has always been an issue with American Apparel, though. I do recall when I still worked in retail and considering places to work, American Apparel was the only store requiring headshots to apply. I wouldn’t go so far to say that that was damaging to my self-esteem, but I can surely say that such application process did leave me feeling far more self-conscious than if I hadn’t considered such.

More disconcerting, though, is the fact that Dov Charney’s American Apparel enjoys priding themself on the fact that their products do not come from sweatshops, but are rather, made in America, and yet, they seem to ignore the blatant social issues, such as the problem with body image and the fact that the average American woman is in fact a size 14. With his overtly sexual advertisements and screening processes, one can’t help but find that American Apparel goes out of its way to promote women (and men too) to be more critical of their bodies and therefore, have a negative perception of their body image and self-worth. And also following Charney’s notion of the fact that a size not featured in the advertisements (drawing connections between Flores’ incident with the showroom and the policy’s “requirements” of head-to-toe examination) is considered to be “off-brand” because their waist size is perhaps 1.5 times that of those in the posters, could he in fact be implying that the majority of America is “off-brand,” or removing the corporate labels, “fat and ugly?”

Image courtesy of FlavorWire and Gawker