Controversy That Surrounds Brandy Melville

By Rachel Gao

Brandy Melville is known for their cute and trendy clothing items. The brand originated in Europe and was founded by Silvio Marsan in 1970. They currently have ninety-seven store locations. Despite gaining much positive popularity, they also gained negative popularity due to their extreme exclusivity regarding their clothing sizes and social media advertising.

Let's start with the 'One Size Fits All' policy. We all know that one size does not fit all. Since the brand is so famous, they have a massive influence on young girls. This policy causes a lot of damage to young teenage girls because it can make them think that their body must look a certain way for them to be deemed attractive or likable when that is not the case.

Young girls will lose self-confidence when they realize that their body does not look good in the clothing because it is One Size Fits All.

'The brand is targeting petite women; what is wrong with that?' this is what some people say to justify the One Size Fits All policy. Shouldn't they also target plus-size women and make bigger sizes to accommodate those with different body types?

One size does not fit all and is a highly detrimental policy for a brand to advocate.

According to one of Brandy Melville's social media managers, they produce clothing by the One Size Fits All approach because it is cheaper to manufacture the same product. What makes this even scarier is that the company's CEO is a male; why should he have any right to dictate what an ideal girl's body looks like? That's just misogynistic, weird, and creepy.

Not only is the CEO misogynistic, but he is also racist. White, tall, skinny, blue-eyed girls are the beauty standard. These types of girls match the exact description of Brandy Melville's models and employees. According to the New York Post, the CEO of Brandy Melville had specifications for girls they would hire. A former senior vice president said, "If she was Black, if she was fat … he didn't want them in the store.” That is a highly disgusting thing to say and creates further division.

If you look at their Instagram page, most posts feature a skinny white girl. Occasionally, a bar will feature a POC model. This is problematic. If the brand was genuinely trying to push for diversity in their models, why not have equal amounts of all POC featured on their Instagram page. It's weird for them to pick and choose a few and then have the rest of their page with white models.

Many people online have expressed their interactions with Brandy Melville employees, which were not positive interactions.

Many have posted YouTube videos talking about their experience. Customers have felt that they were being stared at weirdly and judged because they did not look like the typical Brandy Melville shopper. Overall, most say the environment was not welcoming. Employees have also said rude things to customers, such as "Oh, I don't think that will fit you," referring to the pieces of clothing the customer may have wanted to try out.

Brandy Melville, despite being exclusive, still has hundreds of customers. After reading this, it’s a good idea to think about what kind of businesses you should and should not support.