Fashion consumer statistics at a glance
Fashion spending is easy to talk about in broad trends, but the numbers show a more specific picture: households are still spending meaningfully on apparel, footwear, and the broader consumer basket, even as price sensitivity and channel preferences shift.
The latest figures also show a category under pressure from macro conditions. Some shoppers are trading down, some are still willing to splurge, and channel behavior continues to move between mass, discount, thrift, and online-first value propositions.
Table of contents
- The biggest spending signals
- How apparel fits into household budgets
- What households spend on clothing
- Where shoppers buy apparel in store
- What brands face in the market
- How prices compare over time
- What consumer sentiment says about fashion demand
The biggest spending signals
A useful starting point is the scale of the U.S. consumer economy itself. In 2024, consumer units averaged $78,535 in annual expenditures and had average income before taxes of $104,207, with 135,760 thousand consumer units in the U.S. (BLS Consumer Expenditures 2024).
That matters for fashion because apparel is not a standalone market. It competes with housing, transportation, food, healthcare, and everything else in the household budget. In 2024, apparel and services accounted for 2.5% of total household spending and averaged $2,001 per consumer unit (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
The budget mix shows the scale of the competition fashion faces:
- Housing accounted for 33.4% of household spending in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Transportation accounted for 17.0% (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Food accounted for 12.9% (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Personal insurance and pensions accounted for 12.5% (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Healthcare accounted for 7.9% (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
The practical takeaway is simple: fashion is a recurring but comparatively small line item inside a much larger household allocation system.
At-a-glance household spending
| Category | Share of household spending | Annual average spend |
|---|---|---|
| Housing | 33.4% | $26,266 |
| Transportation | 17.0% | $13,318 |
| Food | 12.9% | $10,169 |
| Personal insurance and pensions | 12.5% | n/a |
| Healthcare | 7.9% | $6,197 |
| Entertainment | 4.6% | $3,609 |
| Apparel and services | 2.5% | $2,001 |
| Cash contributions | 2.9% | $2,292 |
| Education | 2.0% | $1,569 |
| Personal care products and services | 1.2% | $978 |
Source labels remain important here because these numbers are drawn from different published BLS breakdowns in the source statistics set (BLS Consumer Expenditures 2024; BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
How apparel fits into household budgets
Clothing and footwear are not the largest discretionary categories, but they are persistent ones. Households do not buy fashion once and move on. They replenish, replace, and rebalance across seasons, ages, jobs, and life stages.
The data set gives a detailed view of where apparel spending goes. In 2023, women?s apparel spending averaged $655 per household, men?s apparel spending averaged $406, girls? apparel spending averaged $87, boys? apparel spending averaged $96, women?s footwear spending averaged $208, and men?s footwear spending averaged $147 (BLS Apparel data in fashion).
That distribution matters because it shows apparel demand is not just about one broad category. It is segmented by gender and age, and footwear remains a meaningful subcategory within the total.
Household apparel and footwear spend
| Segment | Average spend per household |
|---|---|
| Women?s apparel | $655 |
| Men?s apparel | $406 |
| Girls? apparel | $87 |
| Boys? apparel | $96 |
| Women?s footwear | $208 |
| Men?s footwear | $147 |
Because the source values are household averages, they are best read as directional signals about budget allocation rather than precise universal household rules (BLS Apparel data in fashion).
A second way to read the apparel budget is by ratio. Women?s apparel spend was notably higher than men?s apparel spend in the 2023 household data, and women?s footwear also exceeded men?s footwear in the same set (BLS Apparel data in fashion).
That does not imply every household behaves the same way. It does suggest where the category weight sits when aggregated across households.
What this means for retailers
For retailers, the implication is not just that demand exists. It is that fashion demand is distributed across price tiers and mission types:
- Replacement demand for basics and footwear.
- Seasonal refresh demand for apparel.
- Family-budget allocation across children?s and adult categories.
- Premium or occasion-driven purchases when sentiment improves.
Fashion consumers rarely act like a single market. They behave like a series of overlapping segments with different urgency levels and different tolerance for price.
What households spend on clothing
The category level numbers help explain why apparel remains such a durable retail battleground. In 2024, apparel and services accounted for 2.5% of total household spending and averaged $2,001 per consumer unit (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
That figure sits inside a broader annual expenditure base of $78,535 per consumer unit, which means fashion gets a small share of the wallet but still represents a meaningful dollar amount when multiplied across 135,760 thousand consumer units (BLS Consumer Expenditures 2024).
A few supporting spending lines from the same source context show the rest of the consumer budget pressure:
- Food expenditures averaged $10,169 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Housing expenditures averaged $26,266 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Transportation expenditures averaged $13,318 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Healthcare expenditures averaged $6,197 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Entertainment expenditures averaged $3,609 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Cash contributions averaged $2,292 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Education expenditures averaged $1,569 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
- Personal care products and services averaged $978 per year in 2024 (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
Those spending priorities matter because fashion usually benefits when consumers feel they have room after necessities. When they do not, apparel competes harder with categories that are perceived as more immediate or less deferrable.
Fashion is small, but not trivial
A 2.5% share can sound small until it is viewed in context. Across a large consumer base, even a small percentage of household spending creates a large market. That is why apparel remains commercially important even when growth is slow or uneven (BLS Housing and transportation accounted for 50 percent of household spending in 2024).
Where shoppers buy apparel in store
Channel behavior in apparel is not standing still. The data shows that shoppers continue to spread their purchases across mass market, discount, department, specialty, thrift, outlet, club, and luxury formats.
In summer 2024, the in-store apparel shopping shares were led by mass market retailers at 27%, discount stores at 22%, department stores at 17%, specialty apparel stores at 9%, thrift stores at 9%, outlet stores at 5%, club stores at 4%, and luxury department stores at 4% (KPMG Consumer Pulse Survey 2024).
The year-over-year shifts from summer 2023 to summer 2024 were modest, but they still tell a story:
- Mass market retailers stayed flat at 27% to 27%.
- Discount stores rose from 19% to 22%.
- Department stores slipped from 18% to 17%.
- Specialty apparel stores fell from 10% to 9%.
- Thrift stores rose from 8% to 9%.
- Outlet stores rose from 4% to 5%.
- Club stores fell from 5% to 4%.
- Luxury department stores fell from 5% to 4%.
Channel comparison table
| Channel | Summer 2023 | Summer 2024 | Direction |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mass market retailers | 27% | 27% | Flat |
| Discount stores | 19% | 22% | Up |
| Department stores | 18% | 17% | Down |
| Specialty apparel stores | 10% | 9% | Down |
| Thrift stores | 8% | 9% | Up |
| Outlet stores | 4% | 5% | Up |
| Club stores | 5% | 4% | Down |
| Luxury department stores | 5% | 4% | Down |
The survey base also matters: KPMG?s apparel survey used 1,093 qualified respondents in May 2024, while the apparel-channel survey used 968 qualified respondents in May 2023 (KPMG Consumer Pulse Survey 2024).
That methodological note is useful because small percentage changes should be read as directional, not dramatic. Still, the direction is clear: value-oriented and alternative channels remain strong.
What the channel mix suggests
The channel data points to a shopper who is still responsive to price, convenience, and deal structure. Mass market remains the anchor, but discount and thrift are both important signals that value-seeking behavior is alive.
That is consistent with the broader consumer context in the source set, where trade-down behavior remains visible among U.S. consumers (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
What brands face in the market
The fashion industry is being shaped by demand caution, supply pressure, and uneven geographic outlooks at the same time.
In McKinsey?s 2024 fashion survey, 62% of fashion executives cited geopolitical instability as the top risk to growth, 55% cited economic volatility, and 51% cited inflation (McKinsey State of Fashion 2024 archive).
Sentiment inside the industry was divided:
- 26% of executives expected conditions to improve year over year.
- 37% expected conditions to remain the same.
- 38% expected conditions to worsen.
The growth outlook was also modest:
- Global fashion industry top-line growth was forecast at 2% to 4% for 2024.
- Luxury fashion was forecast to grow 3% to 5% globally.
- Nonluxury U.S. fashion growth was forecast at 0% to 2%.
- China fashion growth was forecast at 4% to 6%.
- Europe fashion growth was forecast at 1% to 3%.
The inflation backdrop was expected to ease somewhat, with the global average headline inflation rate predicted to moderate to 5.8% in 2024 from 6.9% in 2023 (McKinsey State of Fashion 2024 archive).
Industry pressure points
A few additional figures explain why brands remain cautious:
- Apparel and footwear brands collectively in McKinsey?s CPO survey spent about $110 billion annually on sourcing (McKinsey Reimagining the apparel value chain amid volatility).
- Yarn export value across seven major textile-exporting countries dropped approximately 11% in 2023 versus the prior year (McKinsey Reimagining the apparel value chain amid volatility).
- Factory utilization fell from 100% in 2021 to 60% to 70% in 2023 in apparel and footwear supply chains (McKinsey Reimagining the apparel value chain amid volatility).
Those are not consumer-facing metrics, but they affect availability, pricing, and margin discipline. Fashion brands do not just sell into demand. They manage sourcing and capacity under pressure.
How prices compare over time
Fashion pricing is easiest to understand when you compare it with the broader inflation path.
The source statistics show that clothing and footwear spending was 5 times higher in 2024 than in 1924 according to the BLS apparel CPI series, while apparel prices increased by a factor of 2.6 from 1924 to 1974 and by a factor of 1.9 from 1974 to 2024 (BLS Apparel data in fashion).
The key nuance is that apparel price growth has not tracked overall consumer prices at the same pace. In the same source set, overall consumer prices were 18.3 times higher in 2024 than in 1924 and 6.4 times higher in 2024 than in 1974 (BLS Apparel data in fashion).
One especially striking comparison is that apparel prices in 2024 were essentially the same as in 1994, which suggests a long period of relative price stability in the category (BLS Apparel data in fashion).
Price context snapshot
| Measure | Change |
|---|---|
| Apparel spending, 1924 to 2024 | 5x higher |
| Apparel prices, 1924 to 1974 | 2.6x higher |
| Apparel prices, 1974 to 2024 | 1.9x higher |
| Apparel prices, 1994 to 2024 | Essentially the same |
| Overall consumer prices, 1924 to 2024 | 18.3x higher |
| Overall consumer prices, 1974 to 2024 | 6.4x higher |
For fashion consumers, this means the category has experienced long-term price compression relative to the rest of the consumer basket. For brands, that often means margin management, assortment discipline, and inventory accuracy matter just as much as top-line growth.
What consumer sentiment says about fashion demand
Consumer sentiment helps explain why apparel demand can look stable in dollars while still feeling uneven at the brand level.
In 2024, 47% of U.S. consumers reported optimism about the economy in Q4, while 74% said they continued to trade down (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
That combination is important. Optimism does not necessarily mean premium apparel demand automatically surges. Many households remain careful even when they feel better about the macro environment.
More detail from the same source set reinforces that pattern:
- In Q4 2024, 10% fewer high-income consumers said they intended to splurge over the next three months (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
- In Q2 2024, 10% of U.S. consumers said they traded up in the past three months (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
- In Q2 2024, high-income Gen Z consumers who traded up increased from 23% to 27% quarter over quarter (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
- In 2024, 39% of U.S. consumers planned to splurge on dining at restaurants and bars, the top category in McKinsey?s survey (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
- In late 2023, net intent to spend on dining at restaurants decreased by 21%, while intent to splurge at restaurants rose by 38% (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024).
Fashion sits in the same consumer decision environment as dining, travel, and other discretionary categories. It is competing for attention with immediate experiences and must often justify itself through value, style, occasion, or necessity.
Travel and purchase intent
The global fashion outlook also shows travel-related demand still matters. In 2024, 80% of global respondents expected to shop for clothes, footwear, and accessories while traveling, and 28% expected to spend more than the previous year while traveling (McKinsey State of Fashion 2024 archive).
That is a useful reminder that fashion demand is not restricted to the home market or the everyday shopping trip. Travel retail, destination purchases, and occasion-based spending still play a role in the category.
The consumer pattern in one line
Fashion consumers are not uniformly splurging or uniformly cutting back. They are doing both at once, depending on income, channel, occasion, and confidence.
That is why the category can post significant total spending while still showing weak intent in specific subsegments (McKinsey US consumer sentiment 2024; Consumer Edge 2024 Apparel, Accessories and Footwear Report).
Additional market signals worth watching
A few final source facts round out the picture:
- Consumer Edge reported a 3% year-over-year decline in U.S. spending on apparel, accessories, and footwear in 2024 (Consumer Edge 2024 Apparel, Accessories and Footwear Report).
- Consumer Edge reported a 6% year-over-year drop in footwear and athletic apparel spending in 2024 (Consumer Edge 2024 Apparel, Accessories and Footwear Report).
- Consumer Edge found resale platforms grew 1% year over year in 2024 (Consumer Edge 2024 Apparel, Accessories and Footwear Report).
- Consumer Edge reported middle-income consumers cut apparel-accessories-footwear purchases more than any other income group in 2024 (Consumer Edge 2024 Apparel, Accessories and Footwear Report).
- Consumer Edge said Shein?s U.S. spending exceeded H&M and Zara combined in 2024 (Consumer Edge 2024 Apparel, Accessories and Footwear Report).
Taken together, these figures suggest the market is not short on demand, but it is highly competitive, highly segmented, and increasingly shaped by value sensitivity, resale behavior, and income-based differences in purchase behavior.
The most important story in the data is not that fashion spending exists. It is that fashion spending is being redistributed across channels, price tiers, and consumer mindsets.