BS: Levis or Wranglers?

Subject: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 05:45 AM

When I was a teen in the late 60's / early 70's I was, believe it or not, a dedicated follower of fasion:-) My ultimate bit of bad taste was a blue satin shirt with a lace trim; a pair of maroon trousers with a dark blue pin stripe; maroon suede shoes and all topped of with a navy blue cape with a red satin lining. Yuk!

Anyhow, when casual and as far as denim jeans went, the choice was down to Levis or Wranglers. You either owned many pairs of one or the other. Never both! I was a Wrangler person myself, as were my peer group. I will wear anything now but still buy Wranglers when reasonably priced. I have a pair in black and a pair in ice blue at the moment. I have had a Levi jacket but have never owned a pair of Levi jeans and never will on principle now!

How about you lot on the Mudcat? Were or are you in favour of one or the other? Straw poll time! I am only interested in the choice given. All other views will be tolerated but ignored:-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: mooman
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 06:45 AM

Like you I was a Wrangler person Dave and had a pretty similar line in groovy gear to yourself. I'm afraid these days I have degenerated to wearing an assortment of combat trousers but am still faithful to my Doc Martins!

Peace

moo

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 06:53 AM

I was neither and never will be bothered by things like that. I suspect some of your question at least in the UK will depend on your age. I remember watching some program called something like "Adverts That Changed The World" which mentioned Levi and thier succesful campaing with the person in the Laundrette. Here is a short extract from the first web article I just found:

"Levi's began to manufacture jeans around the 1870s, and jeans were originally working men's clothing. During the 1950s people aged 13 - 19 became known as teenagers, prior to this people were all either children or adults. Jeans became popular clothes for teenagers because they were seen as a sign of rebellion against parents and authority.

The jeans wearing teenagers then grew up and become parents meaning that the next generation of youngsters saw older people wearing the jeans and refused to wear them. This forced jeans to become unfashionable through the early 80s.

In the mid 80s Levi's hired a highly successful advertising company (Bartle Bogle Hegarty) who with a series of adverts turned around the situation, resulting in the sales of Levi's jeans rising 20 fold."

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 07:51 AM

Levi's or Lee- never Wrangler

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 10:38 AM

GUEST stole my thunder. But Costco sells a perfectly nice jean under the Kirkland brand, and it's my guess those are also LEE.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,Sleepless Dad
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:13 AM

Did you know that Levi's are no longer made in America ? They closed their last factory in San Antonio within the last year. Now they are all made overseas. That's a shame. I was always a Levi's person but I may need to change.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: CarolC
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:19 AM

Levis

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:20 AM

Don't care. Never checked. The best price is what I go with.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:22 AM

During the '50's as I was in high school, It was Wranglers or Levis.

Wranglers were pre-shrunk. Buy to fit.

Levi's weren't. You had to buy 3 sizes too large to allow for shrinkage.

Whichever you wanted, they all cost $3.00. Jeep

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:25 AM

Price governs my purchase , NOT the label - WHY pay (in UK) £60 for a pair of denims when you can get a pair of denims for £10 . I just wish there was more variety of colour - I am fed up with Blue Black or Fawn !!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Blowzabella
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:58 AM

Levis - they had a 'neater' seam on the outside leg and a 'rougher' seam on the inside leg - Wranglers were the other way round. I'm sure many other differences separated the two, but that's what I remember. My peer group were Levis wearers.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 12:04 PM

Levis. Because of the 'low rise'.....Wranglers ride higher on the waist and are usually looser in the rear.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 12:16 PM

I've never bought a new pair of Levis jeans. I've owned a few hand-me-down or thrift shop pairs, but If I buy 'em new I get whatever's cheapest.

Back in the 70's, when jeans were frowned upon as work apparel for all but blue-collar jobs, I did wear Levis brand corduroys almost exclusively. They were about the only casual-but-not-bluejeans option available at the time.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 12:28 PM

I live in the eight-dollar jeans I get at K-Mart. I think they're "Rustlers." I've had some hand-me-down Levis every once in a while, and I don't like them any better. Levis have always seemed to be overpriced.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Amergin
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 02:11 PM

I don't wear either one....i like to go nekkid....much to the dismay of everyone else...

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 03:08 PM

Bloody hell, Leadfingers! Where do you shop? £60 for a pair of jeans!!! And you must be rich paying £10. What's wrong with Asda's own for £4? (Last Wranglers I bought - The Ice Blue - were £5 in a closing down sale:-) )

:D

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 03:40 PM

When they are £60 I do NOT shop , but I DO window shop . And Asda are so far away its not viable going there to save money Dave .

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 06:14 PM

Stop SHOUTING, Leadfingers. Anyway, why are you shopping for windows when we are talking about jeans?

:D

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 06:16 PM

And I'd WALK 20 miles in the nude to save £6 on a pair of jeans...

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Padre
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 08:35 PM

Lee Riders were the preferred jeans when I was growing up - cheaper than Levis, but a better fit than Wranglers.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 09:10 PM

I remember owning a few pairs of "Plain Pockets" jeans from J.C. Penney. Are they still still around? The jeans, that is, not the stores. Well, for that matter, are J.C. Penney stores still around? I haven't been to a mall in years. Penney's could have gone out of business ten years ago and I wouldn't have noticed.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Scoville
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:16 PM

Whatever the Hell will fit. Damn all you jean manufacturers who make pants for girls with pencil-legs--I'm sick to death of having to buy "extra-relaxed" jeans with stupid girly pleats in front and tapered ankles just because I have big thighs and a small waist. You're really cramping my style. Neither Levis nor Wranglers are cut to fit pear-shaped, extra-curvy chicks.

Speaking of which--does ANYONE make women's jeans out of real denim any more? Even when I was in high school (circa 10 years ago), women's jeans were made with normal-weight denim and had the double seam on the inside of the leg. Now they're all made of something wussy that's more like chambray and will wear out in a week, and don't have any sturdy seams at all.

I finally had to admit to myself that my beloved favorite pair of dark-indigo-with-yellow-stitching Route 66 boot-cuts were just too damned big for me and looked really dumb. I loved those pants. I dream of dark-indigo boot-cuts with no prissy decorations but nobody makes them to fit me.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,John O'Lennaine
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:17 PM

Levis were the choice of my teenage peer group in the '60s, but since I've had to take financial responisbility for a family I have swallowed pride and worn all manner of cheap K Mart & Warehouse jeans.

The pockets in cheap jeans seem to wear out very quickly however, so I have found that it actually works out cheaper to spend the extra and get a decent pair of Levis, in which the pockets outlive the knees.

Mind you, they are nowhere near as tough as they were in the '60s. They used to come with a replacement guarantee against tearing "for the life of the garment". That always amused me.
"My Levis are torn, can I have a new pair?"
"Nah, the're dead"

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,sorefingers
Date: 05 Sep 04 - 11:39 PM

I learned years after giving up trying to fit into either of these brands that they were modeled on people with no ass, long thighs and short skinny shanks - which explains why Levis look so good on a bowlegged famine victim slouching at a burger joint!

All through those years of hell for me - long thigh, long shanks and a fat legged big assed person - there was a brand made for farmer bodied people like me. It's called generic 'Overhauls' - don't ask me to explain what that is becuase I don't know how. Anyway you can still buy em in little country stores - the few that Mal Wart has not closed - where farmers buy their stuff. Popular 'labels' Big Smith, Big Ben etc., top shelf is sometimes 'Dickies'. Now those thangs stand up whether hung or not!

There is one new brand out here - I will not mention it's name since I am not advertising what needs no help in selling - which is both excellent value and well made with broad legs and lots of room to move about - but it ain't droopy drawers fashioniste gobshite wear TG. Most stores have em and they are modeled on well fed American people, hence they fit 99% of consumers. Kinda like t-shirts too, they feel good and look the same. (Big Apple is sweet sometimes, kinda like my Martin Guitar, full of lovely little surprises.... ohhh yeah!)

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Sep 04 - 02:56 AM

When I worked for the Forest Service I wore the J.C. Penny jeans along with the blue work shirts and the white and blue striped hickory shirts. Uniform pants never fit as well as those, even when they were men's pants and I had to put in darts around the waist to keep them up.

I buy jeans if they fit. I never go to the full-price rack unless I'm looking for something that is never going to be on sale. First I look at the thrift store--and Levis and Lees are the pants the fit best. In the non-jeans, Eddie Bauer has some nice fitting khaki's that I wear for work (I dress them up with a sweater or a nice gabardine or linen vest and can get away with some very casual pants that way).

In my closet are thrift store and discount store (Ross) jeans from Calvin Klein, Lee, Levi, Jones NY, etc. My favorite pair of cold weather jeans came, full price, from LL Bean, Flannel-lined Double L jeans. I think they only come in relaxed fit. They are bulkier with the flannel lining, but they feel SO GOOD in cold weather. They're very generous in size; I generally wear 8 or 10, depending on length; the LLBean folks were out of those sizes so I tried a size 6 and it was fine.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Sep 04 - 03:04 AM

sorefingers,

I find a lot of "old fashioned" and "tried-and-true" products (like good-fitting "farmer jeans" you describe) at the Vermont Country Store. I shopped from their catalog for years, but in a search just now I'm not surprised to find them online. Take a look at this place. It may surprise you. My catalog stopped coming ages ago (it probably still goes to my ex instead) but as I think about it, there were always great ideas in those pages, and a lot of things you thought they weren't making any more.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,sorefingers
Date: 06 Sep 04 - 01:46 PM

Hi S R S - thanks for the link, there are a couple of other catalogue companies besides that, which used be in the mail - eg the Blair Catalogue - on line, but though I used make these Vermont booklets in one of my many jobs I did not know they had a website!

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 06 Sep 04 - 05:38 PM

Wranglers without question for two reasons. Firstly, I always liked them better than Levis (and they've always been less expensive.. and still are.) I guess that's two reasons, already. They are about the cheapest jeans on the market around here... east coast U.S.A. The second (or third if you're serious enough to be counting) reason is that they come in one inch length increments... only jeans I can find like that. I have a 29 inch leg. Levi operates under the assumption that God only made even-numbered-inch legs.

Sheesh!

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Sep 04 - 11:43 PM

Jerry, I've been buying jeans too long for years and hemming them to the right length. I remember the varying length on Wranglers, and as a kid I had a few pair, but I never liked their denim or top stitching very much.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 07 Sep 04 - 03:56 AM

Ah well, looks like I'm the odd one for a change ;-) (Along with Richard, Jerry and, possibly a guest who sounded like he liked Wranglers but I'm not sure!) The count is Wranglers - 4 Levis - 8 Neither - 10.

Now, how about underwear... :-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Kim C
Date: 07 Sep 04 - 03:52 PM

Scoville, don't feel bad... I'm short and somewhat muscular with a womanly mid-30s shape. My measurements are proportionate and I should, by all accounts, be able to find jeans that fit. Forget it. I have to try on about a dozen pairs before I find ONE I like. And then when I find the one I like, they quit making it.

All that being said, I prefer Levis to Wranglers, but rarely buy them unless they're WAY on sale. Guess jeans have a good fit for me, but there again, I have to get them at the outlet store with another 25% off.

I like Route 66, when I can find a pair that fit. I had one pair that I still wear, but the ones they have now seem to do that funny poochy-outy thing in the rear waist.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 08 Sep 04 - 11:34 AM

I am WAY too posh to wear jeans.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,Sooz (at work)
Date: 08 Sep 04 - 11:50 AM

When I was a teenager in the 60's it was always wranglers but now the lycra content is more imortant than the maker! I went for some years not wanting to wear jeans at all because I felt I was being cut in half. With a bit of lycra they really do fit like a second skin without having to wear them in the bath.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 09 Sep 04 - 11:08 AM

I probably owned more pairs of Lees over the years than Wranglers, and *never* had a pair of Levis until I was college-age, when I succumbed to fashion and once bought a pair of those button-fly 501s.

I suffer from chronic no-ass disease. Even when my weight has fluctuated to its highest extremes, when I've had extra belly fat lapping over my waistband, oversized thighs, sagging man-breasts, etc. -- I've never had more than a measly, flat, almost concave pair of buttocks. Not even enough to hold up a pair of pants without suspenders or a *tight* belt! This always influenced which brand of bluejeans best fit me in the past, and it's definitely the main reason why I don't currently have *any* jeans in my wardrobe.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,saulgoldie
Date: 09 Sep 04 - 01:23 PM

They had to be blue, period. Other than that, it didn't (and doesn't) matter.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Sep 04 - 06:40 PM

29in legs? You'd be OK over here then, Jerry, the sizes seem to go 29in/31in/33in. I'm 30in, so I can never get a pair to fit...

I'm more for corduroy anyway. Goes better with brown boots and a weskit... And I hate any garments with labels that show! Aside from Mudcat T-shirts,and that's different.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Once Famous
Date: 10 Sep 04 - 12:57 PM

Levi's. Still the orignal.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST,Van
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 12:27 PM

It's down to fit - for a while Wranglers but now back to Levis or Lees for smart - Otherwise Wal-Mart's cheapest. Can you have
Sunday best jeans? ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 04:50 PM

I well remember sitting in the bath for two hours with my new Levi's on and sitting around(much to the disgust of people around me) until they were dry!!!!! They shrunk to an almost perfect fit! I was then "Jack the lad" who had all the young ladies( and some who weren't ladies) chasing him and wanting to be with him....Was it the jeans I ask myself???...Probably!!!! I have to answer. Those days were wonderful...I now wear Wranglers because they are cheaper and fit better without having to do anything....what does that say about me???
Best wishes.

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 06:07 PM

Levis.

In the 60's, the women's Levis didn't fit me right. The waist was too small, the hips too big and the legs too short. Out of desperation, I tried on my brother's levis. They were just right!

I think I was one of the first to start wearing boy's jeans. I was working in retail sales when a Levi sales rep noticed the jeans I was wearing. He thought it was a great idea and asked if I would be interested in modelling men's levis for women.

That was a long time ago but I still wear Levis. Mavericks and all the others were just cheap imitations.

d

Subject: RE: BS: Levis or Wranglers?
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 11 Sep 04 - 06:14 PM

Guest...although no longer with my wife(or my previous wife)...I have to tell you that mens jeans fit women better than womens jeans do...I would suggest all women try them..Best wishes.