The Recessionista Effect

         One day in early July, Leighton Meester and Blake Lively strolled down Prince Street in SoHo while filming the hit CW television show Gossip Girl. Meester wore a gold mini shirt-dress with sneaker pumps and Lively wore a mostly grey maxi dress. Both were made up to perfection with hair that could withstand a hurricane.

         Yet the store they were entering, an accessories shop called Karen Millen, was advertising a “70% off” sale. Apparently, even Gossip Girls need a bargain these days to buy their new “it” bags.

        The recession has hit New York’s fashion market full force. Stylish women are trying to save their money by going to thrift stores and splurging on one-of-a-kind vintage finds instead of visiting trendy boutiques.

        This economic phenomenon has generated a new nickname for the bargain-hunting fashion plate: the Recessionista.

        In New York City, the unemployment rate is 9.5 percent, according to the New York State Department of Labor; it has risen from 5.4 percent from June of last year. The city’s storefront vacancy rate is at 6.5 percent—the highest it has been since the beginning of the 1990s.              

         In SoHo, where many trendy boutiques were once located, one in ten retail spaces has been vacated or will be in the near future, according to Cushman & Wakefield, an international real estate firm.

         Beth Edwards, 27, who works at Free Boutique, a store selling new merchandise in nearby NoLita, confirmed the statistic with her own observations.

         “There’s been a steady decline” in customers buying from the pricier boutique on Mott Street, said Edwards. The shop opened in March 2008, right as the economy was crashing.

         Small, expensive stores like Free Boutique are facing competition from the consignment stores and thrift shops popping up all around them. Three different consigning locations have opened on Mott recently.

         One is Second Time Around, which opened in late June of this year. “There are definitely people buying consignment,” said employee Kelly Kaminska, 22. She thinks this trend is exploding because “people that consign make [money] and people who buy, save.”

         According to the National Association of Resale and Thrift Shops, the Recessionista who consigns her cast-offs can make back 40 percent to 60 percent of the  price she originally paid for the Ruffian Dresses, vintage Gianni Versace pieces, and Oscar de la Renta makeup bags she sells to stores like Second Time Around.

        Another discount—yet upscale—store that is threatening the profits of shops like Free Boutique is Use Your Head. The new store is associated with the SoHo Partnership, an organization that helps homeless people find work, and clothing is donated by designers like Marc Jacobs and Nicole Miller. Yet “certain items are a lot less than they should be,” said employee Gabrielle Mandel.

        Mandel, 22, explained that the store only opened the week of July 12. Although it’s a newcomer in the retail business, Mandel said the store had made around $300 in one day during its premiere week.

        This optimistic outlook is shared by many in the thrift-store business. NARTS said in a press release on August 3, 2009, that 64.1 percent of 263 thrift stores surveyed have seen an increase in second quarter sales compared to the same quarter last year. The average increase was about 31 percent.

       Both Kim Waldo of the Housing Works Thrift Shop in Gramercy Park and Paulo Vinlaun of Vintage, an inexpensive thrift store also in Gramercy Park, have seen the kind of sales increases NARTS had found among its members.

       “Thrift Stores are doing fabulous in this economy,” said Waldo, the assistant manager of the Housing Works shop.  Vinlaun said, “We’re selling more of almost anything.”

        But this doesn’t mean that all thrift stores are going bare due to massive amounts of buying. Even with their discount prices, thrift stores are feeling some pain as customers cut back. Erik Jornen, 47,, an employee at Reminiscence in Chelsea, said of a previous customer’s accessories purchase, “She would have bought both of those rings. Instead, she only bought one.”

        The Family Jewels Vintage Clothing, also in Chelsea, is in a parallel predicament. A staff member of the store, Candace Guttman, said that “summer is always a slow season.”

        Another employee offered an optimistic prediction. “Things in the fall always pick up. By Halloween we’ll be busting a nut,” she said.