When displaying clothing for sale, remember that people prefer to see clothes on people. The next best thing is to merchandise clothing on mannequins and forms. It’s proven that you can sell more when you display it well. Mannequins and forms make it easier for customers to visualize how the garment will look on them. Today there are literally hundreds of mannequins and forms available to choose from. Following is some useful info to help in figuring out whether a mannequin or form will fit your needs.

Space considerations

• Forms give you more opportunities to displays clothing in limited areas. You can use forms as displays on top of racks and hung from walls.

• Mannequins are available standing or sitting, in action or still, and take up floor space.

Merchandise considerations

• Forms allow you to display individual items (tops, bottoms, tee-shirts, swimwear, etc.).

• Mannequins allow you to display full outfits (tops with bottoms, dresses, suits, etc.).

Style Differences

Forms

Forms are available in complete rounds or plastic shells. Shell forms cost between $8.00 and $15.00 with full rounds increasing in price, but are still economical. There are also separate heads, hands, legs, and bottom forms.

Jersey Forms are a long-time standard in the industry. Covered in jersey fabric, they offer smooth contours and shape. Jersey forms make pinning and shaping garments easy. They also offer a classic look with neck block and wood base.

Mannequins

Mannequins come in a lot of styles. Typically mannequins have arms and legs. They can come in all sorts of different poses. Style wise, there are abstract mannequins that have no facial features, sculptured heads that don’t require any wigs, and those that give you different wig styles as options. Mannequins also come in different ethnic styles.

Then there are the headless models considered “timeless” because they don’t depict a specific style or genre. You don’t have to worry about ethnicity, hairstyles that go out of fashion, you don’t have to show age, etc. Retailers like headless mannequins because they’re not affected by current fads/looks.

Both forms and mannequins come in male, female, adult, child styles and in different shapes and sizes (plus-size, pregnant, petite, active, etc.).

If neither mannequins, nor forms fit your needs, consider alternative displays such as flexible forms and metal displayers. These non-traditional displayers offer a more abstract way to show off clothing.