COST OF CLOTHING.

Taranaki Daily News, 1 March 1920, Page 5

COST OF CLOTHING.

PRICES STEADILY ADVANCE. GREAT DEMAND IN EUROPE. The prediction of drapers over a year ago that, despite the ending of the'war, the price of clothing would nut decrease for at least two years was badly received by many people at the time, but time has proved that, if anything, these forecasts erred on the side of optimism (says this Auckland Herald). Not only has there been no decrease in prices, but it is now absolutely certain that the coming season will bring advances in the cost of every line of clothing and drapery that may well strike despair into the heart of (hose faced with the problem of clothing their families, or setting up a home, on a meagre income, They will not even have the solace of the annual "bargain" sales on the usual scale, for several of Auckland's largest drapery firms have decided not to hold them this summer. As one manager remarked, it would be a mere fal-ui;-y to throw away goods at reduced prices which cannot be replaced, save at a much higher figure. The sales will, therefore, be limited to the special pricing of a few ••fa-rliion" lines for which a quick clearing is necessary. In the opinion of a great ■ English manufacturer, quoted recently by an Auckland draper, it will be from two to five years before there is any appreciable drop in prices. Many factors beyond the ken of ordinary folk go to make up the increase in the cost of clothing, but one point to be borne in mind is that wages at all the British mills have more than doubled during the last few years, while the fact that Europe, starved and crushed for five years, is now lamoring for all the things she so long has had to do without, is respons ble for a demand '.hat is out of all proportion to the available supply. From dtty to day, prices in England rise higher. The manager of a local drapery firm stated that he had just been advised that the prices in a catalogue issued u couple of months ago by a great British manufacturing house, which had not even reached Auckland yet, would have to be advanced 100 per cent. ''We don't know where we are with orders now-a-days." he said. "Quite often we cable Home an order from manufacturers' samples, and (lie price advances before' it can be confirmed. Only the other day we placed an order for u certain line at :is "d a yard, and by the time it was received in London, (lie price had risen to os 4d." Facta iike these will have to, be borne in mind by Auckland women when they set out for .t, day's shopping in the near future, for everything—cottons, silks, and all the etceteras of dress will certainly be very much dearer. The adverse rate of exchange with Amer'ea is also seriously affecting the position, and local hcu*e< are dispensing. Willi American goods rather then pay the exorbitant increases in their cost.