Lands' End

Full review
I hate to shop, and I particularly hate to shop for bathing suits, but this summer I've been spending so much time in and near water that my one bathing suit really needed to be supplemented by a few others, plus it was incredibly uncomfortable. I recalled that in all of the Lands' End catalogs I seemed to get, there was always a nearly limitless supply of bathing suits for sale for all different body types, so I logged on to www.landsend.com to see what I could find at their online store.

About Lands' End
First off, from doing my homework on the company, I quickly learned that the name "Lands' End" is intentionally grammatically incorrect (instead of the more proper "Land's End"). Oh, it didn't start out intentional, they made a typo in their first catalog and at the time couldn't afford to change it, but they decided to keep the apostrophe in the wrong place, for whatever reason.

The company started in the early 1960's in a basement, manufacturing boat textiles, duffels, and some clothing. It has since grown into one of the largest direct merchants in the clothing industry, specializing in all kinds of clothing now, but particularly in the casual, sporty, sailing styles. (What I like to call "Bunny and Biff clothes", due to their prep factor.) Lands' End went from selling just through catalog and mail order, to online ordering via their website, and they now have retail outlets as well, including their "Outlet and Inlet" stores, and their sales through affiliated stores such as Sears.

Using the Website
Navigation - 5
The Lands' End website is particularly easy to navigate, with the traditional navigation bar to the left for customer service and other services, a catalog quick reference search on the left, and at the top a heading for each department: women, men, girls, boys, for the home, luggage and overstocks.

Customer Service Availability - 5
Wherever you click on the Lands' End website, you will be presented with their toll free customer service number in the upper left hand corner of the page, just beneath the Lands' End text logo. The "Customer Service" link is just below the number and by clicking on it you can get assistance with shopping, or with your order, via phone, e-mail or text chat.

Shopping Tools & Features - 5
Lands' End uses the exceptionally popular "My Virtual Model" tool to enable their customers to visualize how items of clothing might look on them. This is a nifty little tool, although I don't find it all that useful. It's really just more of a "cool" toy to play with. You can pick your hair style, facial type and features, and your weight and size, including the size of your bust, for women. Then as you choose clothes, the Lands' End site will "dress" your model with those clothes, helpfully showing you how they might look on you. ("Might" is the emphasized word here. The MVM engine pretty much assumes all weight is evenly distributed which as those of us who live in the real world know, it is not...)

There's also a Catalog Quick Order feature, which lets you plug in multiple numbers from the catalog that was mailed to your home, choosing size, color, quantity, monograms and gift box options all from one page for all items. If you're a dedicated catalog shopper, this is the easiest way to enter in your ordering information.

Finally, as you look to purchase each item, you can click on a larger view of each product, change out the colors online, and view a size chart so you're sure you'll be purchasing the correct size. You can even order color swatches to be sent to you from many items, just to make sure you're getting the color you want.

Purchasing - 5
Once you've decided on an item, simply add it to your shopping bag and keep shopping if you wish, or you can proceed to check out. At checkout you can create an account, if you're new to shopping with Lands' End, or you can log in using your existing account, which will have all of your preferences including your address saved. You can change the options/colors/sizes of the items you've added to your shopping bag easily up until you check out, just by clicking on the item and changing its properties within your shopping bag. I did this with a pair of shoes that I decided I wanted in white, rather than in navy, at the last minute.

Post-Purchase Communication - 5
After your purchase, Lands' End immediately e-mails you a confirmation of your purchase. It was instantaneous for me. Within two seconds of hitting the submit button on my purchase I received the new e-mail notification icon on my desktop and found the e-mail from Lands' End in my Inbox.

They also notified me about one day later, when the items would ship, and provided me a UPS tracking number for my shipment. As soon as I got my tracking number I clicked on it, pulling up the UPS website with a delivery date of 7/5 for my items. Sure enough, on 7/5 I pulled up in my driveway to find my package from Lands' End waiting for me on my doorstep. The package was a soft bag with each item wrapped in a cellophane bag inside, perfect for soft, squishy clothing that doesn't need the protection of a cardboard box.

Lands' End Merchandise
Pricing - 3
This is the main thing that has kept me from purchasing from Lands' End all my life. Their prices for most items seem outrageous. $60 for a bathing suit?! I have never made enough money to be able to justify that kind of crazy price for a piece of spandex-like clothing, but I got a bonus recently and so I was able to squint my eyes shut as the prices came up on the screen, and I put in my credit card. Lands' End merchandise is expensive in my opinion. You will find more reasonably priced items in their Overstock category, but the selection is limited. If you can afford it, just grin and bear it, I guess.

Quality - 5
Fortunately, with the astronomical prices you also get superior quality. The bathing suits I purchased are far nicer than my current bathing suit, which will probably retire this year. They're also so much more comfortable, particularly the standard separates that I purchased. The shoes were high quality deck shoes, so I can finally stop wearing just sandals to the boat. I tried on the swimwear, put on some shorts, and donned the deck shoes and immediately felt as if I had joined the "Bunny and Biff set" of preppies. All of the items looked very good together.

Sizing - 4
The standard mix and match bathing suits offered by Lands' End fit me perfectly, top and bottom. I did find however, that the Tankini that I bought fit me perfectly on the bottom, but was a little tight on top, even though both pieces were the exact same size as the mix and match bathing suit sets I had also purchased. I was less enthused by the look of the Tankini, but honestly the top wasn't tight enough to consider returning. I've worn bathing suits much tighter before. I was just surprised to find that the other bathing suits fit so perfectly while the Tankini did not. So if you're buying a Tankini, be sure to doublecheck their size chart before you purchase the top.

The rest of the items ran true to size, including the Mix & Match bathing suit separates I purchased and my shoes. In fact, the Mix & Match separates were so perfectly sized that for once, a bathing suit felt comfortable! After throwing on some shorts and hanging about the house, I actually later took a nap in my clothes and slept for the better part of two hours, which is something I've never been comfortable enough to do in any other bathing suit.

Customer Service & Returns
You can either use the return label included with your order to return your order by mail, for a flat fee of $6.50, or better yet you can return merchandise to any participating Sears store that sells Lands' End clothing and pay no shipping costs.

Because it originated as a catalog company, Lands' End is used to talking to customers via the phone, no hiding from them as some online merchants do. Dialing Lands' End and getting a human on the phone within just a few minutes is virtually guaranteed. I've called once, just with a question, before ever ordering from the company and got a person on the phone quickly. I have never had to use Lands' End's customer service department for any real issues, but I do know that reaching them isn't a problem.

Summary
If you're looking for high quality clothing, of the style that Lands' End specializes in, I highly recommending using their website to purchase from them. With all of the tools that they make available, it's really hard to get the wrong size or style for your body type. The prices are high, but the quality of their products is also outstanding. Lands' End is a perfect example of the "You get what you pay for" mentality.