I walked out of White House Black Market in tears. I don’t think they were discriminating against me, but I honestly couldn’t be sure. Regardless, they really did not care about customer service, and that was really a huge selling point of their store. Typically WHBM has nothing short of excellent customer service. But not on this day. On this day, I left the dressing room quite annoyed. I walked up to the manager and told that I didn’t like being ignored. She apologized. I said, whatever, if someone had actually helped me I probably would have spent money, and then I left. And I promptly burst into tears.
I don’t think they were discriminating against me, but it didn’t really matter, because I was for sure not in the mood to leave my favorite clothing store in tears. I began walking out of the mall with a determined purpose to leave and go do something else with my time. It no longer mattered that I had been waiting for this shopping trip for weeks, well for years, well, possibly for all of time actually, nope all that mattered is that I was hurt, and I shouldn’t have been. I was fed up and I was leaving.
But then, I didn’t. What I did instead was to slow down, take a breath, and sat down on an outside bench. I calmed my breathing, and looked at the reality of shopping, this sucks! It sucked because there were too many people. It sucked because I couldn’t find anything that I thought looked good on me and didn’t hurt while wearing it. It sucked because of the super snotty attitude of those uppity rich kid shops like Prada and Ferragamo, even though I could now afford anything I wanted there, they still didn’t care because I didn’t match their expectations. But that was shopping. And this was the way that shopping has always been.
The thing is, I just never noticed how awful the shopping experience, and especially the outlet mall shopping experience, really is. I was so blinded by the overwhelming gender euphoria that shopping brought on, that I never paid any attention to the long lines, the rude attitudes, the snotty looks, the elbows in the ribs while trying to grab for the last deep discounted cashmere sweater, none of that ever mattered. All that really mattered was the much needed relief.
Outlet mall shopping was one of the only times that I allowed myself to be myself. These were the times back about five to ten years ago when I was deeply closeted and totally unaware of my true transgender status. Sure, I accepted that something was going on, but I really just thought that I was simply “just” a crossdresser. That was when I was sure that I didn’t need to, and would never, ever, ever transition. Haha, hur. I was sadly unaware of how badly dysphoria was beating me up on a daily basis, and I really had no idea that getting dressed as myself, and going shopping for clothes that I had no occasion to wear, was a massive amount of gender dysphoria relief. I kind of thought that I just really liked it.
These days though, things are far different than they have ever been, and I am a vastly different person. But occasionally I am way overly emotional, and I need to remind myself to just slow down and breath, and that I will be okay. So, I regrouped. I gathered myself up and decided to continue on with my shopping adventure. I stood from that bench, sniffed away the rest of my tears, and walked off to the next store.
6 Comments
Sorry to hear you had shitty service. Fingers crossed you find something better next time.
I can understand your frustration, having recently gone into white stuff and found a nice jumper (reduced) I went to the till. One lady in front was exchanging an item and the young lady on the till, obviously new, was trying her best to help. The only other member of staff was wandering around the store on the phone, no interest in sorting the issue. What happened to customer service?
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It is crappy to have an experience like that.
I had built my wardrobe during the pandemic or the majority of it online or surprisingly at Aldi. I remember shopping at this thrift store before the pandemic closed up the stores (even after they re-open you were not allowed to try anything on), and picking out tops, skirts, and pants. Oh one oh so pretty jacket. I would try each item on and go out to where my partner was sitting on a sofa. Of course, I wanted to know what she thought. It was kind of funny because I was not full on presenting yet (the things I bought would be part of that new presentation). But, it was such a joy to shop that I paid no attention to what people might have thought. Except one woman said that that color looks good on you. It was like she saw through the outside and saw the woman me inside.
I feel you did the right thing. Collecting yourself and then deciding not to let it spoil your shopping trip.
I do remember one instance some years ago of what seemed deliberate rudeness by a sales assistant at a womens clothing store. She pointedly ignored my question and walked away. Fortunately another quickly and politely took her place. It stung for a moment, but from the perspective of that particular day and the years that followed, its the only time I really felt out-right discrimination . Even in these times politicians too often encourage bigotry and intolerance, there still seem to be more good people than bad.
I know this post might be over a year old now, but as a fellow transgender person, I’ve really never had problems with White House Black Market. They are my favorite clothing brand as well; most of their clothes actually work well with my body, and I’m pre-HRT with a large upper body!
The exception on WHBM clothes working with my body tends to be their sheath dresses; I know of another transgender Instagrammer who had the same problem with this. Shift dresses are usually the way to go since they are more forgiving.
When I came back out of the closet in December 2021 (after three years of being closeted following the passing of my grandfather), one of the first things I did was buy me a pair of new WHBM pants, and the customer service didn’t disappoint me. Sometimes you get bad sales associates even at a store known for their excellent customer service, unfortunately. I’m usually one to easily forgive, because I don’t know the person’s life circumstances, while also understanding that they might be new to retail work and are still learning some things.
There was one sales associate at a WHBM boutiques who did misgender me back in 2017, but a polite and prompt correction did the trick. Fortunately the store was empty of other customers when this happened. Honestly, I didn’t think the sales associate was intentionally being discriminatory, because she still treated me well aside from this minor slip-up. As far as I know, it could have been her first encounter with a transgender customer, especially given that I live in a fairly-conservative area. Still, I have heard from those working fashion retail that cross-dressers and transgender customers are more frequent than you might expect.
I’ve shopped at women’s stores for many years and have never encountered any problems other than the minor slip-up I mentioned above. In my experience, most places could care less if a customer happens to be trans; if you are just “coming out” as MtF and want to shop for feminine clothes, most of the concerns you might have about shopping in women’s stores are probably not what you’ll actually encounter! If it makes you feel better, you can try going to a store during less-crowded times; I strongly recommend shopping in-store and trying on items, because you will want to know how they fit!
I also don’t have too many occasions to wear feminine clothes but I try to make occasions whenever I can. I do post to social media (primarily Instagram at this time), do swing dancing (which I use as an occasion to dress up a little), and I’m exploring the ideas of making my own personal style lookbooks as well as getting more into vlogging.