KPMG's consumer research has found more than half of shoppers cutting back on non-essential spending — and apparel sits squarely in that category for most households. Yet the same period produced one of the loudest personalisation booms in years: WGSN's trend analysis tracks a surge in what it calls "chaotic customisation", with bag decoration activity up around 85%.
Those two facts look contradictory. They are not. Together they describe a shopper who has stopped buying more and started extracting more from what she already owns. Understanding that behaviour is more useful than any seasonal trend forecast, because it explains what actually gets worn.
Restraint is the new default
The pullback is not panic spending behaviour — it is editing. The pattern researchers keep finding is fewer transactions with higher deliberation per transaction: longer consideration windows, more cross-brand comparison, more waiting for a specific piece rather than browsing for something.
Two consequences follow, and both are visible in retail data. First, impulse categories soften while considered categories hold. Second, returns rise — not because shoppers are careless, but because they are buying two sizes to resolve fit uncertainty rather than risk a wrong single purchase.
A cautious shopper is not a cheap shopper. She is an unforgiving one.
That distinction matters commercially. Restraint punishes vagueness. If a product page cannot answer whether a garment will fit and how it will wear, the cautious shopper does not gamble — she leaves.
Where the money still goes
Spending has not stopped; it has concentrated. Three destinations absorb most of it.
- Anchor pieces. Coats, tailored trousers, structured dresses, good knitwear — items that define an outfit rather than accessorise one. Higher ticket, higher scrutiny, higher wear frequency.
- Fit-solving purchases. Whatever fixes a persistent problem: the trousers that finally work on a long inseam, the top that works under a specific jacket. These convert fastest because the need is precise.
- Small self-expression. Charms, hardware, scarves, jewellery — the mechanism behind the customisation surge. Low cost, high visible change, immediate payoff.
What loses out is the middle: the mid-priced, mid-interest piece bought because it was there. In a restrained market, "fine" is the worst possible position for a garment to occupy.
Customisation as a value hack
The bag-decoration trend WGSN documents is easy to dismiss as a novelty. Read economically, it is rational. Attaching three charms to a bag you already own produces a visibly different object for a fraction of a new-bag price. The same logic applies across a wardrobe:
- Swapping buttons on a plain blazer changes its register from basic to considered
- Belting an oversized dress creates a second silhouette from one garment
- Layering a fine-knit top under a slip dress extends a summer piece into three more months of wear
- Shortening a hem to a specific length on your own leg turns an almost-right dress into a favourite
This is where the trend forecast and the spending data converge: the highest-return fashion behaviour in a cautious year is not buying differently, it is combining differently. Wardrobes that are built on a coherent palette allow this; wardrobes assembled from unrelated impulse purchases do not. It is the reasoning behind how we build our Bestsellers edit — pieces that earn repeat purchase because they combine, not because they surprise.
WGSN's forecasting for the year also identifies a macro shift it calls Guardian Design — demand for products offering security, privacy and reassurance, from concealed closures to anti-theft construction. It belongs in the same story: consumers want purchases that reduce anxiety, whether the anxiety is about money, fit or safety.
What brands get wrong about "value"
Faced with cautious spending, the reflex is to discount. It is usually the wrong lever, and it is measurable why.
Discounting answers a price objection that often is not the real objection. The most common reason a considered purchase fails is uncertainty — about fit, fabric, or whether the piece works with existing clothes. A 20% discount does not resolve any of those. Better measurements, honest fabric weight and clear styling context do.
Frequent markdowns teach shoppers to wait. Once a customer learns your calendar, full-price selling becomes structurally harder, which raises the discount required next time.
Narrow, coherent assortments outperform broad ones in cautious markets. Choice overload increases abandonment when shoppers are already anxious about spending. Fewer, better-explained options convert better than more options.
Copenhagen Fashion Week's recent emphasis on pared-back, wearable design points the same direction: the commercial reward has moved toward clarity. For shoppers, the practical version of this is simple — build around a small palette, buy the anchor pieces properly, and spend the rest of your budget on the cheap variables. If you are starting the edit, dresses deliver the most outfit per purchase, and tops are where a small palette pays back fastest through recombination.
Frequently asked questions
Are people spending less on clothes in 2026?
Broadly yes on frequency, not uniformly on value. KPMG consumer research found more than half of shoppers cutting non-essential spending, with apparel usually classified as non-essential. The observable pattern is fewer purchases with more research per purchase, and continued spending on anchor items and low-cost personalisation.
What is "chaotic customisation"?
A WGSN-identified trend in which consumers heavily personalise existing items — most visibly bags, with decoration activity up around 85% — using charms, patches, hardware swaps and layering. It functions as a low-cost way to refresh a wardrobe without buying new garments.
How do I get more wear out of the clothes I already own?
Work within one palette so pieces recombine, alter hems and waists to your actual measurements, use belts and layering to create second silhouettes, and change hardware such as buttons on plain garments. Each of these produces a visible change at a fraction of replacement cost.
Is it better to buy one expensive piece or several cheap ones?
It depends on the garment's role. For anchor pieces worn weekly — outerwear, tailoring, knitwear — cost per wear favours buying properly once. For trend-led or seasonal pieces with a short interest window, restraint on price is rational. The failure mode to avoid is spending mid-range on something you are only mildly interested in.
Sources
- KPMG UK, Consumer Pulse research — kpmg.com/uk
- WGSN, trend forecasting and consumer insight — wgsn.com
Editor's note: research and drafting for this article were AI-assisted and reviewed by the PHEFEE editorial desk before publication. Figures are quoted from the sources listed above.
