Fancy a New Look? (New Look)

Member Name: jesperado

Product:	New Look
Date:	13/03/09 (152 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good basics and work clothes, affordable, fashionable

Disadvantages: Not great customer service

WHAT IS IT:
New Look is a high street fashion retailer founded in England but with stores in a variety of countries such as France, Belgium, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates. The key demographic for New Look's sales is women between 16 and 30 years of age but in recent years the company has expanded it's remit to include menswear and children's clothing. They also carry a popular 'tween' range called Generation 915 and have women's clothing in tall, petite and maternity ranges. In the past few years, New Look has carried designer ranges from popular celebrity figures such as Lily Allen and Kelly Brook as well as a designer range from British fashion designer Giles Deacon.

GOOD POINTS:
New Look carries a really good range of clothing even in its smaller stores. Most stores have areas devoted to fashion looks, basics and formal/work clothes. They have a good range of sizes from 6 up to 18 (it may go higher but 18 was the largest size I have noticed in their stores). They have an Inspire range in my local store (which is a medium sized city store) which goes up to size 26. A lot of the fashion items and basics are included in this range which is good as women who take larger size often get lumbered with plain boring clothes or slightly frumpy outfits! Best of all, New Look have actually realised that they need more of the most popular sizes particularly in the fashion range. It used to be the case that they would run out of sizes 10, 12 and 14 really quickly as they did not order enough of these but they seem to have got the right balance now.

My local New Look is always very clean and well ordered even during a sale when things can get a bit manic. I've been consistently impressed with the tidiness of the New Look stores I have shopped in. I don't like shopping in really messy, chaotic places like Primark as I like to easily be able to see the clothing as it is meant to be displayed. I often go into New Look for a particular item (i.e. a nice skirt, new t shirt, black work trousers, etc.) so it is nice not to have to go hunting through disordered rails of clothes to find something.

I really like the basics range in New Look and have many plain t shirts and long sleeved tops from there. Their trousers are also good for work as they are smart, easy to wash and competitively priced. My favourite items in New Look are the t shirts with prints on them. They often have t shirts with quirky graphic designs on them such as my favourite item from there which is a light blue t shirt covered with silhouettes of bats that are heavily concentrated at the bottom then get more sparse towards the top. They often have these sorts of striking designs for as little as £8.

I think that New Look is one of the best priced high street fashion stores at the moment in terms of the quality and durability of their clothes and the massive range of clothes that they stock. I still have t shirts that I bought 3 or 4 years ago that are still in excellent condition. I have never had to return an item for being substandard or had cause to complain about any aspect of a New Look store. It is one of my favourite places for work clothes as they are such good value and the trousers are nicely cut and don't lose their shape when washed.

BAD POINTS:
I've found that their customer service leaves a lot to be desired. They are not as rude as stores like Topshop but it is often difficult to find an assistant on the shop floor. I don't feel like I could ask the changing room assistants to get a different size for me if I needed it. Although, this service isn't essential, I think it is good practice and many stores like Next and River Island make an effort to let you know that they would be happy to help in this way. I've seen a lot of assistants standing around and chatting in the middle of the shop floor which looks unprofessional and makes me reluctant to ask for assistance finding something. Unfortunately the till staff are not much better and do the bare minimum without smiling or making an effort to be friendly. Some have even carried on unnecessary conversations which I find a little rude.

A lot of New Look clothing seems to be quite low cut, even the basics such as some of the t shirts and some of the long sleeved t shirts are too thin and are not very flattering unless you have a perfect figure. Some of their fashion clothing looks and feels a little cheap and uses a lot of synthetic material which doesn't feel nice against the skin.

Summary: A good range of clothing and well priced