The Ecommerce Plus Size Clothing Industry's Growth in Singapore

Welcome to the sunny island of Singapore where you'll find a melting pot of culture. Singapore is the home to multiple official races, with Chinese, Malays, Indians and Eurasians forming our citizen base. As you can imagine, Singapore is a food enthusiast' dream come true, but it is also the nightmare for the Health Promotion Board of the country. 

A 2010 censure has reported 40% of the Singaporean population as being overweight, with 10% obese. And things are not getting better; the obesity rate is increasing by 1% each year. With eateries open through the night, and the popularity of unhealthy options like the Indian roti prata, which is oil-immersed pan fried dough, Singapore is on track to being one of the most obese countries in Asia.

Accompanying this worrying rise in the overweight population is the growth of the plus size clothing sector in Singapore. As demand grows beyond what retail stores can accomodate, online only e-commerce stores like Pluspreorder are popping up to plug the gap in the market. Plus size only specialty stores, in brick and mortar and online forms, are growing in numbers. A peek into the city state's many shopping mall and you'll see at least one curve clothing store. 

As retail stores tend to veer on the safe side in terms of fashion, online plus size stores that do not face retail store rental pressure, nor employee costs, are willing to take on the risk and offer clothing that are much more fashionable. For example, compare these plus size dresses options by Pluspreorder to any brick and mortar store, and you will see the difference. Options provided online are usually much more trendy. In fact they usually follow runway trends to a tee.

Also lacking in retail stores are the liberty of choice online. As retail stores have to stock up on various sizes and colours of clothing styles physically, they are unable to offer as many choices as the online stores who do not have to stock pile regularly. As such, online stores are even able to offer rare product items.

An example is plus size swimwear, including bikinis, tankinis and one-piece swim suits. Flattering and affordable options can be found online at a much more discounted rate. It is common to find at least a 50% difference between what is found in retail stores and online. As such it is understandable why there is a huge increase in the popularity of online curvy fashion stores.

The industry in Singapore is expected to grow. In fact, it is expected to be the market leader in Asia. Home grown online plus size fashion stores have plans to expand to neighbouring countries including Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand, where there is a sizeable number of plus size women. Already, these Singapore-based online stores are facing huge demand from curvy women in these other countries.

As the eating habits of people in Singapore remains, the obesity and overweight proportion of the population is expected to increase, and plus size fashion stores will be here to stay.