When I spoke to Benita Kimball on Sunday, of course she was wearing a Curvy Kate. She’s loved the brand since she first saw it in a Bravissimo catalog in 2008 and couldn’t wait to carry it.  She hasn’t been disappointed, either as a wearer or as a retailer–she can’t keep them in her store! Here are the brand’s pros and cons from the eyes of a woman who is both a customer and a retailer.

Curvy Kate Pros

  • Curvy Kate bras gives what Benita calls a “natural hang” rather than causing the breasts to “stand at attention”. She doesn’t want her 32J bras to enter a room before she does (but she knows which brands and styles to turn to if that is what she’s going for). She finds her Curvy Kates to be great for lower cut tops and dresses and for casual wear. [As you know from yesterday’s post, I prefer stand-at-attention bras, so this is a con for me. However, if I ever find a stand-at-attention Curvy Kate bra that isn’t a Show Girl style, I will definitely report on it.]
  • If you like color, you can’t beat  the Curvy Kate color lineup.
  • She never has to readjust her boobs during the day.
  • She finds the bras so comfortable that her breasts are actually slightly painful when she has to take the bras off at night, which is a giant contrast to certain styles in certain brands that feel good for five hours, but where by the sixth hour, she’s thinking, “Lord, cut it off me!”
  • Her favorite Curvy Kate styles are the Lottie and Emily.

Curvy Kate Cons

  • You can’t really say, “I wear such and such size, so that’s what I’ll buy in Curvy Kate.” There is no one size that a woman wears in all Curvy Kate styles. This is great for brick and mortar stores like At Last because a hands on fitter remains essential to the buying process, but it’s a big challenge for customers whose only option is to shop online. If she had to make one generalization it would be that Curvy Kate bras tend to run small. In most brands, she wears a 32J, but in Curvy Kate she tends to wear a 34J.
  • The price in the United States is almost double the European price, so most of her Curvy Kate customers are in their fifties*. Younger women will purchase them because of the sizing, but it’s a special expense for them. For instance, a 24-year-old recently asked her father to buy her a Curvy Kate bra as a birthday gift.

*When I told a friend recently about my Curvy Kate fit issues, she said, “Well, isn’t that line targeted to younger women?” At 46, I’m fortunate not yet to have experienced sagging and drooping, so I felt defensive at my friend’s question.  Style-wise Curvy Kate may be targeted to the younger women, but not fit-wise. As the brand’s “about” page states, “whilst we target a young fashion conscious customer, we focus on attitude rather than age.” It was gratifying to learn that age hasn’t been an issue in the fit of a Curvy Kate bra for Benita’s customers.

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There is a wealth of Curvy Kate reviews available to you in the blogosphere. I relate best to the reviews by Bras I Hate (her shape in the Princess mirrors mine even though I’m a completely different size, and you can find reviews of many other Curvy Kate styles through the link in the right side bar of her blog), and Curvy Wordy, who describes the same issue that I have with the underwire extending too far back.

Yesterday I mentioned that June of Braless in Brasil has removed the ruffle from her Thrill Me, and she has since posted about the deruffling.

Finally, I haven’t given up on Curvy Kate. I’m going to try a 36GG next.