10 May 2021

Gender-free clothing brand Phluid debuts in all Target stores

While gender-free and gender-neutral fashion brands are popping up all over the place — check out Hong Kong's AndAll or Portland's Olderbrother — they're not common outside urban areas. Which is why we're excited to see Phluid launch in all Target stores in the US.

Phluid opened the world's gender-free apparel store in New York in 2018 — The Phluid Project — aiming to creating an inviting and inclusive experience for gender-nonconforming and gender-fluid shoppers. Its collection for Target clearly ties in with Pride Month, with shirts sharing messages like 'proud', 'queer' and 'trans rights are human rights.' Phluid's founder Rob Smith found all but one of the latter sold out in a Target in suburban Georgia just after the line hit the racks.

While Phluid's pieces are currently only found in Target's Pride section, they could well expand beyond those borders in the near future. A widely-quoted 2016 study by Wunderman Thompson found that 56% of Gen Z consumers sometimes buy clothing that isn't geared specifically towards their gender (vs 46% of millennials). That percentage has no doubt increased over the past five years, and will continue to do so if retailers follow in the footsteps of younger shoppers and embrace the blurring of historically gendered lines. Time to get fluid?!

Related: New line of period products is inclusive by design