That is an tailored excerpt from “The Enshittification of eShakti,” via Andrea Grimes. It was once initially revealed in The Flytrap, a worker-owned, intersectional feminist media collective based in 2024.
As soon as upon a time, eShakti was once a unicorn within the fast-fashion wooded area. Their choices had been each on-trend and vintage, and nice for workwear, holidays, or even bridal kinds, particularly for plus-size ladies like me who loved their length customization choices. Ahead of my wedding ceremony, I purchased a cream-colored 50s-style cocktail gown to function my backup robe, as a result of I’m each curvy and mercurial: I sought after choices for my glance on that day, the special day. And eShakti actually delivered. Even higher: the corporate marketed its dedication to “the well being, well-being, and moral remedy of all our workers international” on what’s now a near-defunct web page.
Nowadays, I’m writing about eShakti up to now traumatic, no longer since the corporate flamed out in a impressive going-out-of-business sale, or was once subsumed in any other trend business buyout, however as a result of they appear to have simply … stopped? … after a protracted however mysterious decline. The primary transparent indication that one thing was once up at eShakti surfaced in early 2023 with the beginnings of an internet whisper community—even though a few of it concerned all-CAPS ranting—amongst customers caution of behind schedule and unfulfilled orders. The eShakti web page stays deceptively reside; customers can fill their carts with clothes and accessories best to learn “We’re lately not able to procedure your fee because of technical issuess,” typo and all, on the ultimate step. It’s a irritating and harsh tease, particularly in mild of the untold numbers of eShakti customers who’re nonetheless ready on orders positioned earlier than the check-out serve as was once disabled.
eShakti Was once a Plus Measurement Pioneer
Throughout its heyday, eShakti was once hardly ever a bastion of plus-size illustration, however no less than it by no means performed dress-up with the literal frame politics of fats liberation (as Previous Military’s short-lived, in-store “BODEQUALITY” marketing campaign did). If you happen to couldn’t preview what a tropical-print wrap gown would possibly seem like on a length 26 frame on eShakti’s web page, it’s essential no less than see what it gave the look of to your frame, to your personal reflect. And for numerous customers, that was once a reduction by itself: to easily no longer be marketed-down to with gimmicks and false guarantees. It was once sufficient to simply be capable to order lovely garments in the precise length.
Customization was once a significant draw for eShakti customers, no longer simply because it’s great to have garments that in fact are compatible, however as a result of their made-to-order fashion signaled the promise of extra sustainability and not more waste. eShakti’s goal client base is the perfect marketplace for simply that more or less factor: fashion-minded people with more-than-Endlessly-21 cash to spend, lots of whom were edged out of in-store buying groceries as a result of sizing barriers and occasional high quality.
“Nowadays’s plus-size client is in her 40s, she’s a professional, and he or she’s extra discerning,” mentioned Marie Denee, a way influencer and founder and CEO of the wildly in style web page The Curvy Fashionista. That client, she mentioned, is “extra confident, and she will see throughout the okie-doke” from trend manufacturers creating a cash seize with out making an investment meaningfully in reflecting plus-size customers again to themselves. And that was once all the time more or less a peculiar factor about eShakti—it’s essential order custom designed plus-plus-and-plus sizes from the web page, however by no means see the garments modeled on any person but even so a straight-sized, possibly even AI-generated, fashion.
Denee likened this advertising and marketing tactic to “courting in the dead of night,” announcing “they’re afraid to be observed with us, however they’ll take our cash.” She described eShakti’s obvious dying as, on best of the entirety else, a doubtlessly neglected alternative to construct on a faithful buyer base that, essentially, simply needs to be observed. If eShakti had been to re-emerge and in reality construct again consider with customers, Denee says “they must over-over right kind, and it couldn’t be for a season, it might need to be a part of the combination of the logo.”
After all, eShakti would wish to be operational within the first position for any of that to occur. No matter the reason for its decline—a profit-tanking pandemic, herbal screw ups, or some as-yet-unkowable secret 3rd factor—eShakti appears to be in a peculiar more or less stasis for now. The web page nonetheless exists, minus the check-out serve as.
Regardless that eShakti by no means explicitly promoted itself as a plus-size trend vacation spot, it definitely bought itself as going above and past for its staff—certainly it nonetheless does, on a zombie “about” web page. Custom designed garments are great, however again pay and advantages for the individuals who as soon as made them would put on a heck of significantly better.
