Netizens debate whether Uniqlo is a high-end clothing brand
Uniqlo is so popular that this season’s rugger polo shirt has nearly become the uniform of the young set. The ubiquitous striped polo shirt can be seen anywhere, from college campuses to call center officers, that Uniqlo has become a meme in itself.
Uniqlo is what Penshoppe and Bench were when they both entered the local fashion scene, cool, trendy labels that cost a little more than your average shirt on SM’s retail floor, but hardly high-end, not even by a long shot.
Which is why a tweet posted by @ichanisrara on December 26 went viral for rationalizing that Uniqlo is considered “high-end” in the Philippines, instead of cheap and workaday in the brand’s country of origin, Japan, because of the huge gap in the two countries’ costs of living and economic power.
Woke netizens took offense on behalf of minimum-wage earners at Uniqlo not being labeled “high-end” by those who can afford it. If P590-790 for a single shirt is already high-end. then the Philippines is flooded with high-end clothing stores and restaurants that are doing good business despite our being a developing country.
Oxford Dictionary defines “high-end” as denoting the most expensive of a range of products. By this definition, Uniqlo would hardly qualify, even for a poor country like the Philippines. There are plenty other brands that cost more, including local brands, but are not labeled high-end. Actually, the brouhaha over Uniqlo only illustrates what happens when social justice warriors play fast and loose with universally accepted definitions.
To consider anything that’s expensive and beyond the reach of minimum-wage earners as high-end is woke virtue signaling and misses the point. Because of low wages and runaway inflation, many things have become beyond people’s pay grades but they’re not necessarily high-end. Onions selling at P450 a kilo and supermarket ham going for P590 a kilo are not high-end. Uniqlo is costs slightly more than Bench and Penshoppe, but many consumers, yes even the minimum wage-earner occasionally, would rather pay a bit more for quality.
In the fashion industry, Uniqlo is considered as an affordable casual clothing line. If many people in the Philippines find it expensive, that does not make Uniqlo high-end. It only proves the country’s minimum wage is unliveable.
To put it simply: you can support calls for a higher minimum wage and at the same time not look at Uniqlo as high-end.
