Forever 21 won’t let more than one person into a dressing room, a policy that extends to Aldys and her eight-year-old son. We remember being young, climbing things and looking to run away with strangers, so we were surprised that Forever 21 ordered Aldys to leave her child unattended while she tried on clothes. When she refused and brought her son into the dressing room, a manager called security and told Aldys she had thirty seconds to scram. She calls it as “the most embarrassing and humiliating moment of my life.”
She sent the following letter to CEO Don Chang and CFO Larry Meyer:
To Whom It May Concern:I am a frequent customer at Forever 21 and have done a lot of shopping at your stores with my eight-year-old son who almost always accompanies me here and at other retail outlets. I have always enjoyed shopping at Forever 21 because of your huge selection of styles, colors and variety of clothing that fits any occasion and the reasonable prices.
I say all this because on February 13, 2008 at about 7:45 pm I experienced the most embarrassing and humiliating moment of my life in one of your stores located at the Providence Place Mall in Providence Rhode Island. I would have never thought that what happened to me yesterday was possible.
I was shopping in your store and needed to try on clothing I had selected. As usual my eight-year-old son accompanied me. I went to the fitting room area with my son and handed the attendant my clothing to be counted. She escorted my son and I to a fitting room. As I was about to enter the room she informed me that my son would have to wait outside the fitting room area. I was in complete shock and refused to leave my son unattended in the main area of your store or anywhere else in the store. I told her that I would not leave him unsupervised and brought him in the dressing room with me.
After trying on two pair of pants there was a loud bang on my door and a manager told me that only one person was allowed in the fitting room and one of us had to exit immediately. At this point I became extremely upset, as any person would, never have I been told to leave my son unattended in order to try on clothing. I shop in many different places and was never told that my son could not accompany me in the fitting room. I told the manager that I would not let my son leave the room unless it was with me and I had to get dressed before exiting the fitting room. At this point they called security and stated that I had thirty seconds to exit the room.
I was utterly humiliated and embarrassed as well as very upset. I left the fitting room without tying my shoes and my son had to witness this whole ordeal. It was utterly humiliating and embarrassing. I have never been treated in such a horrible manner by anyone in my life. My son was afraid and felt like he did something wrong. I refused to be escorted out of the store by security and the verbal assault by your employees attracted the attention of all the customers and other store employees.
I only have the names of the two managers who were accosting me: Felix and Tracy. I don’t know the name of the attendant. Had I followed the irresponsible and unprofessional demands of the attendant and managers and left my son alone, something terrible could have happened to him and you would have caused my family irreparable and devastating harm and/or loss. Something any company should prevent and avoid causing, even the suggestion of such. My son is only EIGHT years old and would never need to be left alone with a stranger or in any public place.
Sincerely,
Aldys
Responsible parenting or a reasonable anti-shoplifting measure? Tell us in the comments.
(Photo: Getty)
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She should have just handed the kid a shirt to try on. Voila, problem avoided, kid’s in dressing room next door, everyone goes home happy (and with clothes that fit). Even if they only sell ladies clothes, give the kid a blouse. I bet they never thought to write an anti-cross-dressing policy
To everyone who says “If you don’t like the policy, don’t shop there”: that’s why Consumerist is here, so everyone *else* can be forewarned about the policy, and avoid this place like a Biblical plague.
@WraithSama: Middle school aged? If the kid is eight then he’s in second or third grade. That’s closer to kindergarten than middle school.
The store staff was without a question unprofessional and rude. But practically, unless the kid has serious behavioral or physical impairments, an eight-year-old can be expected to sit outside the door for 15 minutes. My mother never took me into the dressing room as far back as I can remember (post-infancy); she’d always put me outside and tell me to sit quietly, and I did.
And, not that I think seeing his mother semi-nude is going to screw him up for life, but an eight year old is reaching the point where seeing mom nude borders on inappropriate, especially when it’s probably unnecessary. He’s probably old enough to be more embarrassed and humiliated than his mom over the whole ordeal.
My daughter works at that specific Forever 21 store.
I know they have cut staff hours recently to save $$, and everyone who works on the sales floor and dressing room is feeling stressed during busy shopping hours. Not an excuse, just an observation.
@ThumpinD: From my experiences of shopping at Forever 21, I don’t think their employees are good arbitrators of anything, let alone the safety and comfort of their customers and their children. My local Forever 21 is definitely a case of the inmates running the asylum. The entire store looks like a vapid teenage girl’s messy closet. And wouldn’t you know, the “employees” ARE vapid teenage girls! They’d rather chat with each other than serve customers. So no loss either way, really – just stop shopping there. But I must ask, what woman old enough to have an 8-year-old child would shop at Forever 21? Oh wait, one that clearly wants to BE “forever 21″, and probably had her kid when she was much younger than 21…
For all those saying that she should have left the store when informed of the policy I understand what you’re saying but I’m not in complete agreement. A lot of times if you’re faced with a policy that you think is unreasonable you can make the decision that you’re going to ignore the policy. And a lot of times in that situation the company you’re doing business with will decide to let you get away with it because they want your business.
Now was it a stupid policy? I think it really depends on the setup in the dressing room area. If it’s spacious enough probably the kid could have waited just outside the door. If it’s a narrow passageway to the dressing rooms then the kid’s presence would have made it more difficult for other patrons to use the other dressing rooms.
Regardless the managers’ behavior was extreme.
@Dashrashi: Unfortunately when I read this story most of the comments were not showing up. So, even though I did read the comments, not all of them were there at the time. I guess you haven’t noticed how this website occasionally has problems with that.
Also, you should turn down your bitchiness before trying to interact with other people.
Now, I haven’t been in a Forever 21 since before I was 21, but I seem to remember that those kinds of stores have tiny dressing rooms. This would mean that her little boy was not just watching mommy change, but probably getting a face full of mommy’s crotch or butt as she was trying to put on pants in a crowded dressing room. That probably isn’t why the store said he couldn’t go in, but I would think that would be a good enough reason not to bring your kid in if you were thinking about it hard enough.
@lennybee: She WAS NOT nude. She was trying on pants. He would have been seeing her in the the equivalent of a rashguard and bikini bottoms.
Furthermore, my mother did take me into dressing rooms. Imagine that, different mothers with different practices.
@veraikon: Maybe she needs to or chooses to shop there because it’s cheap. It’s not necessary for you to be so judgmental when you don’t know her situation.
@samurailynn: Other people have already said that in their experience, F21 dressing rooms are huge. Perhaps that was in the part of the comments you “weren’t able to” read. I hope that problem has cleared up for you. Usually it just takes a refresh or two. But I don’t think you can make any assumptions about the size of this particular dressing room.
I think the policy is reasonable after a certain age limit, and maybe she had a big 8 year old and they didn’t see the problem with asking her to leave him outside.
But for those of you to compare living in this day and age and leaving your 8-year-old with strangers to yester-year you need to get with it. Today’s society is much more dangerous. I remember when I was a kid my parents let me walk to school, which was a mile and a half away, with no problem. I wouldn’t dare let my children walk to school alone at the age in the same area today.
I think they were wrong in not letting her take her 8-year-old, that is too young to me. And yes, there is nothing wrong with her trying on pants in front of an 8-year-old. I doubt she had any evil intentions in mind, if so she wouldn’t even have mentioned it.
The kid’s a minor. The parent decides and I agree with her decision.
Also, come on. It’s his MOM. There’s nothing wrong or mentally scarring with changing in front of your child unless you decide to create a taboo about it. Especially if she was just trying on some pants. Heck, do you guys always walk around dressed from head to toe because your kid might see your thighs?
@IrisMR: How wrong you are, Iris. Just think, soon he’s seeing his Mom change in front of him, the next thing he’s robbing banks or stealing bibles.
I mean seriously people, he’s 8 Year Old. Girls still have freaking cooties to him, so he’s not going out and having sex just because he saw his Mom change.
@WhirlyBird: avoid this place like a Biblical plague
Oh, I see what you did there.
I’m going to have to side with the people that believe that if she didn’t like store policy, that she should have left without trying on the clothes and not patronized that business again.
The store has full right to set store policy, and to also remove her if she refuses to abide by it. I’m not defending their tactics, but just stating the facts. I imagine the policy is there to avoid theft, because people are not beyond hiding stolen goods on their children…not saying the poster is that type of person.
I went to David’s Bridal a few weeks ago to try on dresses for a friend who is getting married. To our surprise, the mostly female-dominated store had a few men wandering around in the dressing room area, with their wives trying on dresses. I felt extremely uncomfortable by this, as women were trying on dresses, many of which require contorting the arms to zip up, so women walk out and ask their friends or a sales associate to help them. Men in the area made many of us uncomfortable. If it were a young boy, probably less so, but we would still wonder about how okay it was for a parent to let their son wander around where women were changing.
@Pylon83: As to what an irresponsible parent that let’s their kids run everywhere? That seems to be what you’re advocating.
@cde: Give me a number, I’ll have a friend tell you his experience with CPS without any evidence, he was eventually exonerated in the end and spent copious amounts of money on a lawyer. Why don’t you do a google search on CPS abuses.
just a thought in the world today… why should an employee just take the her word for it that she is the mother. If someone molested a child in the store everyone would be saying that “how could a store let some one go into the dressing rooms with a child… they should know better”
@kruz01: Exactly. On the other hand, if the store employee did think something was fishy and called cops when everything was okay, can you imagine the outcry at that one? Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Being a parent, I personally would have called the police for the activities that occurred at this store. To “order” someone to leave in 30 seconds, at the expense of their being humiliated, is totally unacceptable. Lock the door, call the police, and have them file charges of child endangerment on the manager and employees of the store. THAT is really what was happening here. Expecting a child to be unattended, in today’s world especially, is totally unforgivable.
@CharlieSeattle: So people breaking the law somehow make something I do bad? Tough shit for your friend. Maybe he looked at the CPS agent funny.
@Crymson_77: Child Endangerment? By telling them to gtfo? You have got to be kidding.
Puritanic response thread: check.
Overzealous rule followers: check.
Nannystate CPS suggestions: check.
Houston, we are “GO” for “threadjack!”
@Crymson_77: Why do people still not understand this – the store never once told the mother she had to leave her child unattended. The store merely told the mother her son was not allowed to wait in the fitting room area. There’s a world of difference between the two and if anyone doesn’t understand that, then they probably aren’t smart enough to be a parent.
@TheUncleBob: The store policy resulted in an untenable choice for the shopper/parent. The de-facto result of their UNREASONABLE policy was that the customer was told you can either put your child at risk or go shop somewhere else. That attitude in and of itself warrants consumer/parent outrage. The “legality” of their policy is completely irrelevant. We are in the court of public opinion here. The customer should never have been put in that position in the first place.
Query: If I had a store and said that my policy was that black/disabled/jewish people are not allowed in the changing room should that be ok? What if store statistics indicated that there was a greater likelihood of shoplifting with those groups? Does that make the policy ok? So why would discriminating against people with children be any different?
As I have tried to point out several times, store policy does not necessarily carry the weight of law. You cannot establish/enforce a private rule that is against public policy. And furthermore, regardless of whether parents of young children should be a “protected class” is not really relevant. The purpose of the letter (as I read it) was to convey to the upper management of a company an extremely unpleasant shopping experience at one of their stores that was the result of a questionable policy (or at the least, the result of extremely poor judgement in enforcing a policy).
Although the manager’s subsequent demand that the customer get out w/in 30 seconds and be escorted out of the store was rather harsh, it is also irrelevant to the underlying issue. The focus should be on the policy itself. And after a careful weighing of the risk-reward balance (i.e., preventing theft/making some customers more “comfortable” vs. endangering the welfare of a young child) it seems like a no-brainer. If theft was the primary concern (a legitimate one) then they could have let the child stay in the fitting area in PLAIN VIEW of the parent and the attendant. Problem solved. If the concern was that an ADULT woman was upset that an 8-year old child was going to “check her out” then the adult woman should grow the hell up. I mean get real. Who is in a better situation to alleviate the problem in the easiest manner? The parent who would have to leave their child alone and unsupervised? Or the adult who could simply avoid the problem by not leaving the fitting room half-naked? There are plenty of places that a parent should not bring a young child… a clothing store is not one of them.
@UpsetPanda: I’m not sure how you can “equate” adult men walking around in a woman’s dressing area with an 8 YEAR OLD CHILD waiting for his mother! To me, that is completely insane.
P.S. To those who have raised the question, over the years, I have seen mothers take their young sons into the ladies restroom and I have seen fathers take their young daughters into the mens restroom. While I’ve never been thrilled with the situation, I’ve always appreciated that it was the lesser of the two evils.
@Dodger88: “Query: If I had a store and said that my policy was that black/disabled/jewish people are not allowed in the changing room should that be ok? What if store statistics indicated that there was a greater likelihood of shoplifting with those groups? Does that make the policy ok? So why would discriminating against people with children be any different?”
First off, the policy was not that the young child could not be in the fitting room area. The policy was that the child could not wait in the fitting room area and that it’s limited to one person per fitting room. That’s not discrimination (except, maybe, against siamese twins?).
Second – and this is going to be an unpopular opinion – but, I’d like to go with Ron Paul here – if a property owner doesn’t want a particular race, gender, age or class of people on their property, then yes, the property owner *should* be allowed to decline to allow those people on their property. Likewise, we, as consumers, should have the right to determine where we want to spend our money.
Finally – you keep trying to make your point, claiming that the customer’s only choices were that she had to leave her child unattended or take him into the fitting room with her. Again, as we discussed, these were not her only options.
Was this a bad business decision? Probably. But shouldn’t it be the right of the business to determine how they want to run their business? If a customer doesn’t like it, they can leave and shop elsewhere.
@TheUncleBob: First, the EFFECT of the policy was to preclude parents with young children from being able to shop at the store.
As to your second point, everyone is entitled to their opinion as to how far “property rights” should go. However, as a society, “we” have decided that it is not permissable to refuse to serve someone based on things like skin color, religion, etc. I don’t think it’s that much of a stretch to say that a store should not be able to discriminate against people based on whether they have young children. (Yes I know that the stated purpose of the policy is not to prevent parent with young children from shopping there, but it is the natural effect of the policy. Much the same way that the south used to use “literacy tests” to keep minorities from voting at the polls. The stated purpose was not to discriminate, but that was clearly the effect.)
Finally, these two choices (leave child unattended or take him into the fitting room with her) were the options available to her if she wished to be able to make a purchase. Since they would not let the child wait in the fitting area and they do not allow returns, she really didn’t have much of a choice did she? And perhaps you don’t have children or perhaps you have tons of money for babysitters (a good one can easily make 2-3x the minimum wage that the attendant was probably making), but not everyone can get a babysitter every time they have to go shopping.
The bottom line is that regardless of whether the store had a legal right to have a policy that effectivly prevents parents with young children from purchasing clothes at its store or not, IT IS A BAD POLICY (at least the way it was enforced here). And the purpose of the letter appeared to be to call the company out on its bad policy. And many of the people commenting (even many of the ones who support the store’s right to set whatever policy it wants) appear to think it’s a bad policy. So perhaps the company will pay heed to the comments and clarify the purpose/enforcement of the policy so that situations like these do not come up again.
Out of curiosity, if the woman had simply left in a huff after the initial refusal to allow the child to wait in the fitting area and then wrote her letter complaining about the policy, would you support her claim as a reasonable complaint? I guess I’m just trying to figure out if it was the fact that she had the nerve to violate the store’s policy that is coloring your view of the situation or is it just a pure libertarian analysis.
@Dodger88: “First, the EFFECT of the policy was to preclude parents with young children from being able to shop at the store.”
So, if I can find multiple parents who have managed to shop at Forever 21, then I could prove that this policy did not exclude parents from being able to shop there, right?
This is like saying a store policy that says I can’t bring a firearm on store property prevents me from being able to go on store property if I’ve got a gun. Now, granted, I could leave my gun unattended more easily than I can an 8-year-old child, but the point is the same-this parent had many other options open to her – none of which it is the store’s responsibility to point out for her.
Question though, what if this mother needed to use the restroom? I’m sure most of us can agree that a women’s restroom is no place for an 8-year-old boy. Let’s assume this parent is shopping in places that don’t have “Family Restrooms”, as a lot of places don’t. What are her options then?
>”However, as a society, “we” have decided that it is not permissable to refuse to serve someone based on things like skin color, religion, etc.”
Oh, I completely agree, we, as a society should agree that it’s not cool to discriminate. However, why should “our” firm moral groundings be *forced* onto everyone else? If someone has built a business from the ground up with their blood, sweat and tears, why are “we” to tell them how they have to run that business? So long as they’re not polluting or some other thing that *forces* their business to encroach on our private life, what does it matter to “us”?
>”Much the same way that the south used to use “literacy tests” to keep minorities from voting at the polls.”
The difference is that US Citizens have the *right* to vote. It is a government institution funded by our tax dollars. However, there should not be a law that says a private individual (or company) *has* to allow an individual or group to encroach on their private property.
>”Out of curiosity, if the woman had simply left in a huff after the initial refusal to allow the child to wait in the fitting area and then wrote her letter complaining about the policy, would you support her claim as a reasonable complaint?”
I’ve said all along that’s what she should have done. I’m not going to comment on if it’s a bad policy, because I don’t know *why* the policy was established, but I can say I wouldn’t have cared if this mother had just left the store, *then* complained. To borrow from an analogy someone posted earlier, imagine getting pulled over for speeding on a virtually deserted road. The officer is nice and lets you off with a warning (i.e.: telling you that you can’t do what you want to do). Instead of listening, you peel out and continue speeding. What do you think is gonna happen?
When you’re shopping, you are a *guest* in someone else’s house. Follow their rules while you are there. Feel free to complain about them if you disagree – but follow them. If you just absolutely can’t, then leave and go to someone’s house who will let you do whatever it is you want to do.
Now, I have a question for you – do you think the “One Person per Fitting Room” rule is a bad policy all around, or do you think the store should make exceptions in cases like this?
@Dashrashi: Um. I said “semi-nude”. Yeah. And like I said, he’s still living a fairly normal life even if he does see his mom fully nude. All I was saying is that what happened was probably unnecessary, that’s all; but she can raise him however she cares to.
Parents fault! If the kid was younger, I could understand. Seriously, I think at eight years old that kid should be able to listen when his mom says “sit there and do not move or touch anything until I come out.” My step-sister is 9. You don’t even have to tell her “don’t move, don’t touch”. You say, I’ll be right back and she’ll either sit and wait or look around a bit and not go running around the store like some sugar hyped up brat with no home training.
The store was beyond unreasonable, some children can’t be left unsupervised.
@BugMeNot2: “This reminds me of this one time I was at the mall — true story. I had just bought a drink, and as I approached the door of one store, a clerk promptly told me that I am not allowed in the store with the drink. Funny thing is, instead of being in complete shock and insisting on going into the store with my drink anyway, I went shopping in another store that didn’t mind.
”
But did the clerk start yelling at you about your drink while your where in the dressing room, yelling at you that you had thirty seconds to leave or else they where barging in, perhaps while you were naked? Or is your comment just based upon the headline? (I know it saves time.)
I am currently an assistant manager at Forever 21 and we have recently changed our former policy within the past week. We now allow parents to take their children in with them. We still do not allow more than one girl or guy in a fitting room due to theft issues and to keep things under control.