Has anyone else noticed how the sizing of LAS uniform is totally haywire? I just ordered some new trousers as mine were looking a bit knackered, and as I’ve put on a few pounds (as one does working in that room) since joined I decided to go for the next size up.
So while my original trousers were a bit snug, my bigger trousers are so tight I can’t even fasten the button. Same make, same style, two inches “bigger”. They aren’t even made of a stretchy material so it can’t be that. I’m sure I have heard other people in the room saying similar. What on earth is going on?
October 3rd, 2006 at 6:57 am
Its the gremlins in the factory just messing with your head
Hope your doing good, just finished a dispatch course here, meh, rather be on the street, but dispatch will work bit better, (better hours, no 24hr shifts), dont think would have done it if not for reading your column, anyways, take care be good
October 3rd, 2006 at 9:55 am
I have two pairs of jeans that I bought on the same day from the same store, both the same size on the label. One pair is noticeably tighter than the other.
Actually, they’re both tighter than they were when I bought them two years ago. Can’t understand why that would be.
October 3rd, 2006 at 12:48 pm
It’s all to do with how the pattern pieces are cut out. Deep in a factory in Darkest Somewhere, there is a massive stack of sheets of fabric on a cutting table, and a thing that’s a bit like one of those jig-saws - vertical saw blade set in a holder. The jig saw is used to cut the pattern pieces out, but (a) if the clothing is being made on the cheap, the pieces will be cut out a tiny bit smaller (because then you can get more pattern pieces to a piece of fabric, so less waste, so can charge less), and (b) the pressure from the cutting blade means that the stack of fabric doesn’t lie straight, causing a noticeable difference in size between pieces cut from the top of the stack and pieces cut from the bottom.
October 3rd, 2006 at 1:40 pm
It’s not just the LAS. I know someone who had 3 different St. John Ambulance shirts, supposedly in 3 different sizes. The one that was supposed to be smallest was biggest, the medium sized one was smallest, and the supposedly biggest one was in the middle somewhere.
In fact any uniform I’ve ever come across for any company or organisation seems to bear no resemblance in sizing to the clothes you would buy on the high street…
October 3rd, 2006 at 5:25 pm
Well, I have just ordered my student midwives uniform and I am normally a generous 14-16 in the high street but I have had to order a size 20 tunic - size 20!!!
October 3rd, 2006 at 8:09 pm
I don’t know about uniforms, but the women’s clothing world in the US uses sizing as a marketing tool. I was one size when I was 18 and am exactly the same size now, more years later than I care to specify. But my clothing size has gone _down_ two whole steps.
For years, I couldn’t understand what was happening. One day I happened to pass the sort of high-priced boutique where I never shop, and saw they were having a sale that brought the stuff down to near-Walmart prices. I popped in. In that store, my size was practically negative. When I boggled, the sales clerk explained that people were much quicker to buy smaller sizes. I guess when you’re trying to sell suits for a thousand dollars, that really becomes an issue.
Admittedly, sizing is less of a problem in men’s clothing. But my point (there is a point to all this) is that maybe the lack of meaning to sizes in the wider world affects the patterns they use for everything, even uniforms.
October 3rd, 2006 at 11:34 pm
Hey, sorry to hear that LAS is now suffering the lottery that is uniform sizing. I’ve got three pairs of trousers in the same size (well, that’s what it says on the label) that are different lengths and waist measurements.
It’s become worse since the manufacture was centralised IMHO.
Ho hum, better order some more now they have decided what the new Trust is to be called.
October 4th, 2006 at 6:28 am
…or it could be that the tiny foreign person who is cutting the clothes out in whatever sweat shop , whereever is making the pants for fellow tiny foreign people and the order got switched.
October 10th, 2006 at 3:50 pm
I’m in St. John too, and I’ve had a coupld of problems with the trousers - green and black!
I usually can’t get a standard size 8 to fit as they are too big, however a size 8 from St. John was far too small around the waist and had no chance of sitting down in them lest I split myself across the middle! And the size 10 is a little snug as well. However, I can get into the 915 range at New Look for a 13 year old!!
October 15th, 2006 at 12:38 pm
im a sja as well and yes everyone is right the sizes are amazingly stupid lyk an xxs size is somthing like 32″ what is going on?
December 14th, 2006 at 9:13 pm
Anyone notice that 90% of SJA members are a bit on the large size?
March 12th, 2007 at 9:03 pm
So are the NHS staff, you should see the size of the FAT Controllers in SECAmb Banstead
Chocco Fat McB……………..s