Apparel is the word describing every garment, shoe and accessory product sold and amounts to about $1.2 trillion/yr. This amount of money is not spent only to protect the wearer from the elements-any more than the money spent on telecommunications is spent to convey vital information. Most of the value in apparel, perhaps 80%, is spent on solving psychological needs.

And therein lies the opportunity. As the value is beyond functional, substitution of psychological jobs by new products is a matter of engineering better solutions. Consider the behavior of US teens: anecdotally, theirspending on apparel is fading as the solution to feeling good about themselves increasingly relies on a device and service. Already, in this context, apparel retail is in crisis while buying shifts to devices.
—Horace Dediu, Apparel is next