Working from home is pretty much the new normal for a lot of us now. And because of that, our wardrobe choices and tendencies are wildly different than they were when we were going into the office every day. We don’t even remember the last time we laced up dress shoes.
But there are times where we need to put on a professional appearance, and our usual T-shirt uniform just doesn’t look the part. Enter the “Zoom Shirt.”
It’s not some special shirt that helps you access a virtual meeting, but it’s the one that you likely go to when you’re facing clients. It might be an oxford, a sweater or a polo shirt.
The New York Times had a story on the phenomenon recently.
Choosing a Zoom Shirt isn’t simple. Ironically, a garment that rarely leaves a single room needs the same qualities as a travel shirt: durable, easy to store, able to front in a variety of social settings. It also must come on and off in a flash. The Platonic ideal of the Zoom Shirt stays mostly buttoned all the time, with just enough of them undone to get the thing over your head.
This sounds like the perfect opportunity for a branded button-down or polo shirt. A good polo shirt maybe with some athletic wear capabilities gives the professional look for when you need to speak with clients, and if it’s embroidered it provides plenty of brand visibility. And for those who are now used to comfort at the home office, it’s something that doesn’t feel too restrictive or oppressive.
“Putting brands in visible spaces when you’re conducting online meetings is so vital during this period,” Gina Barreca, director of marketing for Vantage Apparel, told Promo Marketing last month. “While it is obvious that you will be showing up for these interactions, it’s important to ask if your brand showed up, too.”
Providing a few color options, too, helps create the illusion that we’re doing laundry and regularly rotating our clothes, instead of wearing the same basketball shorts every day at least.
There are other accessory options, like scarves or sweaters that companies could provide their employees while they’re working from home, or even add to a company store. It’s an option that might be worth pitching to any corporate client with large numbers of remote work employees, especially if they conduct customer-facing business virtually.
