Collegiate Times

The choices you make during beach week stick with you for the rest of your life. I should know: My friends have kept mental, and in some cases physical, logs of my outbursts, never failing to bring them up at inappropriate times. 

Too many cases of Coca-Cola shut off my filter that week and as a result, dark, personal secrets were divulged. One crazy, caffeine-fueled evening led to the revelation that my favorite retail store wasn’t actually Best Buy as I usually claimed.

I proceeded to wax poetic about the greatest clothing establishment to ever grace this unworthy planet: Kohl’s.

My love affair with the store goes back to childhood. For far too many years my mother would buy clothes and bring them home for me to try on. It was an efficient system, but eventually, I was forced to take a more active role.

The first trip we made to Kohl’s changed my life. This wasn’t like Macy’s or JCPenney — boring clothing prisons where I would pose mannequins in rude positions until we could go into the mall.

It was a wonderland of superhero T-shirts and infomercial gadgets seemingly designed to entertain young boys dragged in by their mothers. Clothes shopping still wasn’t as much fun as hiding behind tractors at Home Depot, but it was a vast improvement as far as this rambunctious boy was concerned.

My fondness for Kohl’s has only grown deeper throughout the years, as my interest in clothes has increased from nothing to somewhat. I can meet all of my needs in a half-hour of shopping at a store five minutes away from my house — streamline that process any more and the new shirt might as well fly through a tube into my living room
upon order.

Sure, no one will mistake their neighborhood Kohl’s for a Brooks Brothers, but any shopper with vague notions of style can find tasteful outfits. Even the biggest bros can walk out with a bag full of “Total Frat Move”-approved apparel, including a pair of fresh Sperry’s.

The store’s dizzying array of brands is matched with perpetually low prices to create the peanut butter and chocolate taste dynamo of the retail-clothing world.

I used to be embarrassed when my high school friends mocked my borderline obsession with a mid-priced department store. No longer, though; I am proud to be a Kohl’s shopper and embrace whatever stigma is attached to that label.

Blacksburg residents want a Kohl’s in town and for good reason: The franchise is synonymous with high quality, affordable
clothes.

I stand with you in support of this noble cause. We already have tasted victory in burrito form with the arrival of Chipotle — now let’s bring a Kohl’s to fulfill the rest of our shopping needs.

This time next fall I want to be able to walk into a Kohl’s, hear the terrible contemporary pop elevator music and know that everything on my shopping list can be taken care of inside this bustling monument to practical fashion.

Kohl’s in ’11: That’s change we all can believe in.

A version of this article appeared in the Oct 19 issue of the Collegiate Times.