Last week I showed you category performance over time. The result was ... chaos.
When I see chaos, I dig into what might be causing chaos. Apparel Tops have performed reasonably well over time, certainly not exhibiting the dramatic declines observed elsewhere. I produce a "Class Of" report to understand how different merchandise classes are behaving. Here is the Class Of report for Apparel Tops.
Ah. This table has so much information in it. New item development is reasonably consistent over time ... 799 styles to 757 styles to just 637 new styles last year to 748 new styles in the year just ended.
Look at how much demand new items generate in year two. Three years ago, new items generated $4.6 million in year one and $2.0 million in year two. Two years ago, the relationship was $4.6 million / $2.3 million. A year ago the relationship was $3.7 million / $1.7 million. In other words, new items either die off quickly or are quickly discontinued. When this dynamic happens, it is critically important to constantly replenish the assortment with new items. "Beans" (The Internet's Only Variety Store) appears to replenish new items within Apparel Tops at a reasonable rate.
Of course, Apparel Tops is a category that is hanging in there.
Fashion, on the other hand, is struggling. What does the Fashion Class Of report look like?
Do you see the change in management of the category?
Look at new styles by year ... 120 to 175 to 167 to 97.
Look at demand by year ... $1.2 million to $1.5 million to $1.4 million to $0.8 million.
The category isn't dying.
The category is being killed by Management ... or more specifically, by the Merchant in charge of Fashion.
Obviously there are times when it is good to kill off a category ... customers don't like the merchandise, times are changing, gross margins are poor. I asked Paisley Ingram, the Owner of Beans (The Internet's Only Variety Store), her thoughts about Fashion.
From: paisley.ingram@beans.com
Sent: Sunday, May 3, 2026 8:06 PM
To: Kevin Hillstrom <kevinh@minethatdata.com>
Subject: RE:
Kevin, thank you for noticing this trend within Fashion. Our Chief Merchandising Officer, Sloane Montgomery, thought it was a good idea to trim the assortment down to winning items, giving customers a focused assortment to browse from. As Sloane says, "It doesn't matter how many new items we sell, most items appear new to customers who haven't seen the item before". She thinks you might want to dig into the problem more carefully, identifying marketing issues that led to the demand shortfall.
Best,
Paisley
From: Kevin Hillstrom <kevinh@minethatdata.com>
Sent: Sunday, May 3, 2026 6:15 AM
To: paisley.ingram@beans.com
Subject: Category = Fashion
When I analyzed Fashion, I quickly observed that the number of new items in the past year was cut nearly in half. This reduction in new items led to a significant reduction in demand in the category. Is there a reason why this happened?
Thanks,
Kevin
