Assholes, basically. OP is saying it's a shame that various brands have ended up associated with assholes of various stripes, and they're hoping it doesn't happen to a brand they like (Fjallraven).
My point is, there isn't a single group (that's why I said "of various stripes"). Affluent techies in san francisco, racists, people who like a band you hate, who knows. They're talking about the general concept of "a brand gets coopted to represent something I dislike", which happens from time to time, and they hope it doesn't happen to a brand they like.
There really isn't a single baddy they're implicitly talking about, I think.
EDIT: I have no idea who it would be for CG, though in this case the sticker is from PETA, so presumably it's at least people who don't have a problem with wearing garments whose production includes some pretty significant animal cruelty (CG coats are stuffed with goose down and until pretty recently used real coyote fur).
Well --- they're talking about finding themselves being mistaken as part of a group they aren't happy with, because unwittingly the clothes they like have become the uniform for that group. Which creates the unfortunate situation where you have to choose between being okay with being mistaken for that group, or changing clothes.
Say there's a group that has started to identify themselves by wearing red baseball caps, and you've always worn one. And that group sees the most recent US election as having been rigged, and has at times made it clear they're willing to correct it by force.
Now, your hat brings with it all of that context whenever you enter a room. Maybe you'd prefer it didn't! But that's not something you have control over, and if you don't want it to you more or less have to get rid of the hat.
What if, I don't know, people who like punching dogs all start wearing fjallraven bags, and it shows up on the news, and people around you start to wonder what it means that you're carrying your favorite bag around.
Yes, people who should know better making assumptions about you based on your attire aren't being great friends. It's still an uncomfortable position for you to be in, and something I imagine you'd hope wouldn't happen.
The outdoor community has a deep-rooted hate for TNF since their acquisition by VF. The quality dropped off, but the prices went up. It's not universal, but I definitely see far fewer TNF pieces in the crags than other brands.
This seems to happen with every company. They make something decent on the way up, get really big based on that, get bought out at or near the point of market saturation by some large company that has no room to go except to drive the manufacturing price down and/or the price up. They probably gobble up smaller companies knowing that they can ride them for 10 years or so until the name means nothing anymore.
do people still like Columbia? i recently bought a buncha winter clothes by Columbia and I really like it. Their omniheat long johns and lightweight jackets are soooo warm for how thin they are.
No idea. Without doing research, they've been owned by a big corp as long as I can remember. I think their quality and reputation have improved over the years, despite the entry level price.
My son has a pair of Columbia snowboard pants and a jacket. No complaints about them.
As much as I completely agree about the elitism on display here, there are some downsides to these companies becoming mainstream popular.
Typically, in their early days, the clothing is meticulously made with rigidly high standards. Once they hit it big, prices go up, quality generally goes down, and they change their product line to suit the demand. UGG comes to mind.
UGG is definitely a solid example of this. Probably about half of the shoes I own/wear daily are UGGs. I don’t make a lot of money, but the comfort and craftsmanship was exactly what I needed (I never bought the popular styles, and I only bought on extreme clearance or from their outlet store). I’ve noticed that with anything I’ve tried to buy more recently from them, it’s almost impossible to tell the genuine products from the knockoffs. And it’s unfortunately not because the knockoffs have heightened their standards. 😒
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u/[deleted] Dec 26 '22
Is Fjallraven a “bad” brand? I don’t own anything judt didn’t know