Research...

[denny]

In the best tradition of men asking about questions about women's underwear: "A friend wants me to ask..."

[Poll #725667]

I won't be passing on the names of who answered what, just letting them see the results as anyone can. The information is going to be used for commercial purposes (i.e. picking a good price-point for selling underwear, I guess) so if that bothers you, please don't answer.

Comments

[aiwendel.livejournal.com]

said £20 or less which is mostly true, I tend to search the sale rails and come up with things under a tenner, and under a fiver if I can manage it.
Also ticked the "its better quality" but acutally you never can tell really. My longest lasting bra was £4 and pretty (ok sale rail there), I've had more expensive ones fall apart, though if they did that quickly I'd probably take them back, whereas I wouldn't bother for a cheaper one.
I digress. Anyway. if it's nice enough I'd go up to £25 or even £30 (if it's REALLY nice). If it was more expensive I would expect matching bits to be available, (though I'm annoyed if they only have thongs as I value comfort...) and really I've only started caring about the matching thing because Oli does. But then that's the point in pretty/expensive underwear rather than basic comfortable stuff right?

And breaking into the pretty market will be easier than breaking into the comfort market, where people stick to what they know, so it's a better place to start.

Matching knickers good. Suspender belt nice but unecessary I'd say, as thats more of a minority market I think.....

Hope that's helpful....
xxxxx

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

I suspect it will be - thank you :)

[aiwendel.livejournal.com]

:)

[naath.livejournal.com]

I'd prefere to pay as little as possible. I tend to end up paying circa 30 pounds because no-one makes cheap bras in my size. A good idea there - sell bras in *all sizes dammit*! (The part where you are contemplating custom made R&P stuff is the point where the market has failed)

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

What is your size? Or more generally, what sizes do you think are under-represented in shops and in what styles or whatever? I had an ex who was 34DD who complained she could never find anything that looked pretty, only comfortable stuff - although she seemed to find a fair few pretty things when I started paying for them :)

[naath.livejournal.com]

I'm a 34E which I can now get in M&S. Sizes which are impossible to find in most shops are small band and large cup for instance 28F. I generally pretty-and-comfy bras OK but find it difficult to get Really Silly ones for money that I can afford.

[sepheri.livejournal.com]

How much 'would' I pay, or 'do' I pay?

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

Hrm... I guess 'would' is more relevant. Is there a big difference, do you get your underwear free or something? :)

[sepheri.livejournal.com]

*lol* I wish

Well I tend to pay around 25 - 30 pounds for a bra but I would have no problem paying up to 100 for something really special. But then, the money I spend isn't my own so perhaps that makes a difference.

[missyasmina.livejournal.com]

I rather pay more for a braa with good quality.
It should last for a while,(color too) have the possibility to change the shoulder-straps, look good, feel comfertable on, and give the support where one needs it without giving marks on ones shoulders or back,or make it look like ones boobs are falling out.
If it does all that, I dont care about the price.

[libellum.livejournal.com]

I'm in the sale rail camp. I don't think I've ever spent over £20 on a bra (unless you count the leather one!). Theoretically, if I was richer, I would spend more for a very well-fitting, comfortable, flattering bra, but I don't think I'd ever spend more than £30 of my own money on one.

Matching knickers definitely a bonus, although they're always so expensive! A bra/knickers combo easily costs £40 and just ... no, not unless someone else was paying.

I tend to be quite lucky with bras at the size I am, although a lot of them have far too "pointy" cups. Either I have space in the front of the cup, or my boobs won't fit in and get squished by the nuderwiring at the edges. Are other people's boobs more flexible or something? I like underwiring, but catering for rounder shapes (and people whose breasts aren't like, right next to each other, because mine really aren't) would definitely be good.

[libellum.livejournal.com]

nuderwiring!!!

*amused*

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

Are other people's boobs more flexible or something?

Yours are pleasantly firm.

[aiwendel.livejournal.com]

I have the not enough space between bra boobies problem, though I think mine are particularly far apart *measures* at nearly 2 inches... bloody annoying with unforgiving nunderwiring ;) ... Apparently not all women have touching tits shocker...
the stretchy material ones are definately a winner for solving my odd tit shape...

[mr_magicfingers]

Oh dear, you're talking to a man who has spent over £200 on a basque in the past, $100 on a bra, £50 on matching panties etc. Oh once you get into italian and french designer underwear, kiss your yearly profit cheque goodbye.

Worth every penny though ;)

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

Denny, i think it might be vitally important that I meet this man!

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Come to Planet Angel (http://planetangel.net) with us on Friday rather than Beemovie? That way I still get to meet you!

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

nice website, but doesn't appear to contain venue information?

I am not entirely certain that that sort of event is compatible with unreliable legs/energy levels. Plasticene and lego is good though!

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

The venue is Top Sekrit Information, but I shall reveal that it's a long way from your part of London. Relatively close to mine in fact.

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

That's not happening then. There's monsters if you go further south of the river than borough market, dave told me.

It seems rather anti accessibility to keep the venue secret - there's alot of us need to know quite alot about venues before we can plan to go anywhere!

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

You only have to join their mailing list to find it out, it's not that Top Sekrit :)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

It's anti-commercial and spreads by word of mouth rather than advertising, but I could email you the flyer if you're interested :)

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

Thanks, but it's too far away. Maybe in the summer when I have more time to collapse afterwards.
Quit why you'd sell tickets on your website but not say where it was is beyond me. Either neither is anti commercial or they both are, it seems logically inconsistent to do one and not the other.

I'll talk to dave about weekend plans and see if we are planning to go anywhere and let you know? are you around the whole weekend?

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I don't interpret it as being anti-commercial myself, just as an attempt to keep a nice 'word of mouth party' vibe about the place - the same kind of feel you get to illegal raves, essentially. Half gimmick, half serious attempt at sociological engineering :)

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

That makes alot more sense, and would probably make even more had I ever been to an illegal rave :)

[mr_magicfingers]

Hello, *waves*

I'm afraid the days of me spending that sort of cash died the day I walked out of the oil industry. I'm but a poor massage therapist now, besides my wife would probably be a little put out at me spending large sums of money on underwear for someone else.

I have been asked to take other peoples husbands shopping for underwear though. Which leads to amusement as I show them how to go through their wives underwear drawer to check for sizing etc. Interesting what you find along the way.....

All the information about the venue/date etc for Planet Angel is on the website, you just have to know where to click. When you join the mailing list they tell you this. The venue is 5 minutes walk from Vauxhall tube and only about 20 yards south of the river, so it's not a long way off.

Hope to see you there sometime.

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

"besides my wife would probably be a little put out at me spending large sums of money on underwear for someone else. "

Ask denny why this is not, in factn the reason I wanted to meet you.

Leaving th poil industry is probably a good long term investment plan, I'd imagine, if only for the soul.

[mr_magicfingers]

Ah, hope I didn't offend there, was a flippant remark meant in jest. If you wanted to get in touch, Libellum has my email address and you're welcome to drop me a line.

Yep, my current employment is indeed very good for the soul, and I love my job very much. Now I just have to find a way to make it pay a little more than it currently does. I have plans...

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

It mainly made me giggle.

Do the plans involve massaging richer people? I gnerally find that the way to get more money is to do stuff for people with more of it to give away.

[mr_magicfingers]

Not so much massaging richer people, but working in an environment where i work for myself and don't have 70% of the cut going to someone else. The charge for a decent massage is fairly standard around London, but the difference in what you take is the big thing.

Plus, I do outcalls where I take my table to someone's house/hotel etc and that's a side of the business I want to grow, low overheads and therefore higher profit.

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

Hmm. 70% is ridiculous.
When my ex partner worked for evil globecorp.inc, the upside was that they contracted massuers to come and do massage to promote health and effectivess in their employees! Sounds a bit like the house/hotel stuff?

If you are interested in islington I see a physio in a place that hires him the room, they seem to attract the money and he hasnt comaplined of the percentage.

[fellcat.livejournal.com]

Which leads to amusement as I show them how to go through their wives underwear drawer to check for sizing etc.

A word of warning: many women − I've seen estimates as high as seven in ten − wear the wrong size of bra, either through ignorance, or through the correct size not being commonly available and so having to make do with an approximation.

[mr_magicfingers]

This is very true, I see this problem every day with women who have back/shoulder issues often caused by a badly fitting bra. However, if women can't get their own bra size right, they can't very well give their man grief for doing likewise. If you want to buy something as a surprise, you have to at least have a guide to go by when shopping.

The old 'holding your hands up to your chest and saying 'they're about this size' ' isn't very helpful in a lingerie store.

[fellcat.livejournal.com]

I'm a Bravissimo girl to the tune of 32F, and until the founding of that marvellous company I would have been ticking the invisible box marked Would you pay more for a bra because… it's the only one in my size within a fifty mile radius.

Hence, I hope that your friend is making bras in a good range of sizes.

[dryad-wombat.livejournal.com]

Actually, the single biggest thing that determines whether I buy a bra is "Is it in Marks and Spencer on the ghastly day I nerve myself to go bra shopping?" I'll happily pay masses for a bra if it cuts short the wearying saga of trying the bloody things on. I am only willing to endure that saga once every couple of years or so, and I go to M+S for them because they have so many. I barely have the patience to endure an hour in just one shop, let alone anywhere else.

[dennyd.livejournal.com]

Perhaps it would be worth buying a load over the 'net and then returning all the ones that don't fit? I dunno how much that kind of thing is frowned upon by the retailers :)

[bluecassandra.livejournal.com]

Lingerie is excluded from the list of things the government soecifies must be returnable (along with latex!). Some companies will still accept it on strict terms, others really won't, you get the occasional mugs like us at SHQ who are fine with all sorts of returns . . M and S have a website, it's worth checking their policy.

[fellcat.livejournal.com]

Bravissimo accept returns, provided that they've only been tried on (i.e.: not worn for long). Their instore fitting service is a lot more friendly than M&S IME.

However, their cup sizes start at D.