The Company I Keep
Though it’s doubtful, perhaps I’m maturing or getting taste, but the clothes are crap everywhere I look. Ok, I only looked at New York & Company but even amidst their mediocrity I often find one or two reasonable items (seriously, no one believes that I’ve actually unearthed unhideous duds there). Not so, recently.
I think it’s the midtown dilemma. Something that would be $9.99 in the boroughs (or the rest of America) seems to stay at $39.99 at this location. This shiny, newish NY & Co. lacks the chain’s major calling card: the sloppy sale rack. No one shops at the former Lerner because they actually love the clothes. At any Brooklyn branch, the full-priced front displays are desolate with just a lone security guard milling around. The crowds are all crammed in the back where the marked down stuff is.
Not only was former stalwart NY & Co. a bust when I paid a visit last week, but my go-to cheap shoe store, Strawberry, a couple store fronts down, had been decimated, it was just a shell. Not that I mind having that lame excuse for a Strawberry put out of its misery. I only went twice since setting up shop in this part of midtown and both excursions were beyond fruitless. The stock was depleted and miserable, and now I know why. Boo to the east 50s—Bloomingdale’s is no substitute when I need a cheap and borderline tacky fix.
New York & Company * 715 Lexington Ave., New York, NY
I went to the daffy’s and bolton’s on 34th st, they had some affordable stuff.