By Peggy Diaco
Contributing Writer

You can’t find them in the mall, you can’t buy them in a store. You cannot even order them from a website like Amazon.

Colorful LuLaRoe yoga pants are exclusive, elusive and, according to some regular customers, addictive once you find a fashion consultant (FC).

“People were constantly stopping me on the street and asking me where I bought my yoga pants,” said Victoria Morales, a fan of LuLaRoe yoga pants, describing her visit to China and Japan this past summer.

A difficult question to answer as you need to know someone to buy them or find someone selling them at an event.

Fashion consultants on Facebook have exclusive groups. Once you join a group (by invitation only) you can participate in a “pop-up boutique.”FCs will post the day and time they are having their next sale on Facebook. If interested, post a reply with your name and they will add you to the list.

On the night of the sale, your LuLaRoe FC posts pictures of different patterns of yoga pants (LuLaRoe calls them leggings) and other styles of clothing such as shirts, skirts and dresses.

If interested, you reply “sold” under the item. An email will be sent to you with a link to an invoice requesting order and credit card information on a secure server.

According to the LuLaRoe website, DeAnne Stidham, the founder of LuLaRoe, created these unique clothes as a way to stay home with her children and provide for her family in 2012.

The business took off and found her soon recruiting people to help her sell her clothing line. Marisa Grier of East Stroudsburg is a LuLaRoe FC.

A full-time teacher, Marisa sells LuLaRoe clothes from her home and calls herself a “momprenure.” She owes the clothing line popularity to their comfort as well as the limited edition designs.

“I was a customer for two years and because I was investing so much money, I finally decided I may as well sell them.” Marisa says.

Patterns are varied, colorful and feature unicorns, flying pigs, whales, flowers, radios, multicolored swirls and abstract designs.

Once a particular pattern is sold out, it is gone. Once sold out, limited edition patterns are done, never to be made again, which adds to their current popularity. LuLaRoe Yoga pants sell for $25.00 a pair. Patterns that have been discontinued, such as the Unicorn pattern can be found by collectors for a much higher price although LuLaRoe frowns on selling their line on internet bidding sites such as Ebay.

Disco 2 Avert Scams, a website that tracks online scams posted that some of the drawbacks to LuLaRoe leggings is that they can run or have a defect and returning them can take a long time.

The customer is also not guaranteed to receive the same pattern as it may have been discontinued.

There have also been complaints from consumers that tax has been charged in states where there is no sales tax on clothing.

An exciting current trend, LuLaRoe clothing has turned into a profitable business for DeAnne Stidham.

Her small home business has expanded to fashion consultants in all 50 states. Hand sewn on personal sewing machines, the clothing line is not manufactured on assembly lines.

This trend has created jobs in the United States as well as other countries such as Korea, Guatemala and Vietnam. DeAnne Stidham’s family is involved in designing, making and distributing the clothing according to their website: lularoe.com.

Email Peggy at:
mdiaco@po-box.esu.edu