John M. Hollister had an unquenchable thirst for adventure. A Yale graduate, he spent his summers amidst the surf off the coast of Maine, and dodged the Manhattan establishment expected of him by his conservative father, choosing instead to sail the South Pacific in a fifty foot schooner. In 1922, he settled on the West coast, and after the birth of his first son to the beautiful daughter of a Dutch business man, he founded Hollister Co. as a dedication to his new-found, beloved California.
None of that is true. Hollister Co was, in fact, established in 2000, as a ‘child brand’ of Abercombie & Fitch, but this is the pseudo-history created by the company to give it that ‘vintage feel.’ Weird? I thought so. But if you find the invention of a clichéd back-story mildly disturbing, you are not yet familiar with the full extent of how unsettling an experience shopping in Hollister can be.
Hollister shops are designed to replicate vintage surf huts. Perhaps this works in California, where the shop front faces on to lapping tides (and where people know what a vintage surf hut actually is), but under the strip lights of a Newcastle shopping centre it looks more like a shed.
At the doorway you are greeted by a pair of topless male models flanking the entrance like majestic stone lions. Only the stone lions by the entrance aren’t greased up. Now I appreciate the finely honed male form as much as the next person, but I don’t expect to have my clothes stained with body oil as I attempt to edge past it. Inside, the shop is made up of numerous small rooms, where the clothes are organised seemingly without heed to garment, colour or even gender. Perhaps the role of the greeters on the door (as they appear to, as yet, have none) should be to hand out complimentary maps and compasses, as without cartographical aid it is near impossible to navigate one’s way around.
To further disorientate the confused shopper, Hollister eschew the tradition of lighting a shop brightly enough for the customer to actually view the product, and opt instead for what can only be described as gloom. Picking one’s way through the murk, dodging inconveniently placed potted palms, staggering occasionally into a blinding spotlight and subsequently falling backwards into a display of brightly coloured hot pants, the feeling of having accidentally stumbled across the set of a low rent porn film grows discomfortingly. Except that the shop attendants are impossibly attractive, convincingly windswept young things, rather than washed up aging actors.
Don’t get me wrong – Hollister clothes are good quality and well priced, and I didn’t leave the store empty handed (though for a while I thought I wouldn’t leave the store at all). However now that I’ve Been There, Done That and Bought the T-shirt, I won’t be returning. Avoiding the hot, dark, uncomfortable and confusing experience (which I can only imagine is similar to being given birth to) that is shopping in Hollister. The twenty pounds online delivery charge is well worth it.
SoCal? SoWhat?