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No Shirt. No Shoes. No Service. Does this business standard need revamping?

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dresscodesign Not so long ago, customers understood the rules. In order to be served or enter a business establishment you had to adhere to easy to follow dress codes. The rules were simple
Today, not so much.

If you go to London you better have clean clothing. london service sign

When in Australia, you may find some very specific instructions on what is and isn't acceptable dress wear.Australia Dresscode

To help explain its dress code, the Vatican opts for visuals, The result? Everyone knows exactly what you can and cannot wear. Vaticandresscode

Which brings us to the very bizarre saga of Southwest Airlines and the young woman one customer service representative said was dressed too inappropriately to board the flight. It does have many consumers scratching their heads and saying, 'WTF?"

On Friday, Kyla Ebbert- the  young woman who got the tongue lashing from the Southwest Airline's customer service representative appeared on The Today show.
The incident was reported online by Mike Celizic

In an exclusive appearance Friday on TODAY, Ebbert modeled the outfit she says she wore on the flight in question. It consisted of a snug-fitting white top with a scoop neck that stopped just short of showing cleavage.Over the shirt was a green sweater that buttoned underneath her bosom. It was finished with high-heeled sandals and a white denim mini-skirt with a fashionably frayed hem.

According to the report, it was after Ms. Ebbert was on the plane and listening to the flight attendants go through their pre-departure routine that a Southwest employee identified only as "Keith" told her that her clothing was inappropriate and asked that she change her outfit.

He told me, ‘I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to take a later flight. You’re dressed inappropriately. This is a family airline. You’re dressed too provocative to fly on this flight,’ ” she told Lauer.

“I said, ‘What part of it, the shirt, the skirt? Which part?’ “ Ebbert continued, recounting her conversation with Keith about her outfit. “And he said, ‘The whole thing.’“ I said, ‘I didn’t bring any luggage with me. I don’t have anything to change into. What can I do to make sure I can get onto that flight?’ I had a doctor’s appointment. I had to be there.”

“He said ‘You can go to the gift shop and you can buy something to wear there. Until then, you’re not flying on this flight,’ ” Ebbert said.

A compromise was finally reached when Ebbert promised to pull up her top, which wasn’t showing cleavage to begin with, and pull down her tiny skirt.

That led producer Dan Fleschner to write on allDay Today's Family
Blog,

At first, when she appeared on the set, it didn't seem like her outfit was so inappropriate. It was clear that her skirt was pretty short, but it didn't seem worthy of getting a lecture from a customer service representative on how to dress.

But when she sat down, we learned just how short that skirt was -- when she flashed our national television audience. Yeah, that skirt was short.

So there are a lot of questions here. What is appropriate dress for flying? Who should decide what is appropriate? Should airlines have a dress code? And without a dress code, can an airline block someone from flying?

The story is accompanied by a poll-- 51% say Southwest is wrong.

SWairlines

Southwest Airlines has a blog called Nuts About Southwest. So far the only response by Southwest is this post called a Different Perspective

A lot of you are familiar with the Southwest Airlines Customer who was asked to cover up her outfit, and there has been a lot of attention devoted to this subject.  In fact, the Customer was on the Today Show this morning.  You might be interested in the perspective of one of the show’s producers, Dan Fleschner.

Blogs being blogs, Southwest is getting an ear full from its customers.
From Robert k Ando

What has happened to the Corporate Culture thing? The shoddy treatment of the beautiful, young Miss Ebbert has me wondering. She should have gotten an apology. Has Southwest gotten too big for its hot pants? Oh for the days of friendly, beautiful young ladies in orange hotpants and free fifth of scotch or bourbon on holiday flights!!! I am so disappointed that I may not fly SWA for

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LizaWasHere 5 pts

It is discrimination, and IMO it is wrong.

Whether it is illegal discrimination is a separate question; it is true that 23 year olds and blonds are not protected classes under any US civil rights law. And whether SWA was completely within it's rights is also a complicated question. I expect that it will depend on the fine print in the ticket purchase agreement, but that document probably does involve SWA saying that the customer agrees that the airline can refuse service under fairly broad discretion.

Having said that, it does seem strange that a company as casual as SWA would suddenly decide to unforce a passenger dress code. I would have been much less surprised if Saudi Airlines ( http://www.saudiairlines.com/ ) declined to allow a female passenger in such a short skirt to board a flight.

Liza
Founder & Coordinator, LesbianFamily.org ( http://www.lesbianfamily.org/ )
Personal Blog, LizaWasHere ( http://www.lizawashere.com/ )

eljeffe 5 pts

Calling this discrimination, at least in any legal sense, is simply wrong. There are very specific "protected classes" which may not be discriminated against; blond 23-year women are not included unless you believe that this was done specifically because of her gender. That, of course, would fly directly in the face of common sense given the tens of thousands of women who fly Southwest every day (none of which I've ever seen wearing anything quite like this). I personally hope they would do the same thing to any 23 year old male that decided to wear a thong on board.

You may disagree with Southwest's policy or handling of the situation, but the fact is that they were completely within their rights.

sassymonkey 6 pts

If there was ever an emergency and the plane had to be evacuated I'd prefer not to get friction burns on my butt on the way down the slide. Therefore I would never wear that on a plane. But if she was ok with it hey, why not. If there are dress requirements they need to post them.

Personally I'd prefer they do something about cologne than short skirts.

Sassymonkey ( http://sassymonkey.ca/ ) and Sassymonkey Reads ( http://sassymonkeyreads.wordpress.com/ ).

kperfetto 5 pts

Although no one will admit to it, there's definitely racist overtones there. I said this on another topic, but there's a mall where I live that prohibited bandannas and "do-rags."

I as a thirty-year-old white woman have been in that mall wearing a blue bandanna, and no one asked me to leave.

Five Dollar Camera ( http://www.fivedollarcamera.com/blog/ ) & Five Dollar Radio ( http://fivedollarradio.blogspot.com/ )

Elana Centor 5 pts

As part of the last generation that had to wear skirts to school, our principal made us take the knee test. if we bent our knee on a chair and you saw skin, you were sent home. Somewhere around the end of my senior year, the mini skirt became popular and I broke school policy -- at the time it was the most rebellious thing I did.

elana
Blogher Contributing Editor,Business&CareersFunnyBusiness ( http://funnybusiness.typepad.com/funnybusiness )

kimber30 5 pts

When I saw the picture of Kyla Ebbert, it made me think of my 16 year old daughter and most other girls between the age of 16 and 25. Nothing more, nothing less.

The guideline that my daughter was given at school is the "finger tip rule"; when she hangs her hands down at her sides, the hemline must be below where her fingers end. A fashion adviser visiting their school advised that an ensemble will not look trampy if a "balance" is established: if you show legs, cover shoulders/chest/back; if you are wearing a tank top, longer clothing on the bottom.

Kyla seems to have fallen within these guidelines albeit barely. If someone was able to get a glance of panties, it was still less than he would see on any "family" beach.

The point is, they are guidelines, not laws, not company policies.

I would be much more comfortable on an airplane sitting next to this clean, stylish lady than the un-showered, bad-breathed, coughing, obviously cramped person who I usually spend 4 hours with; watching him grow over the armrest into my space.

The airlines seem to have no problems making the seats smaller with every "improvement" on their airplanes but they are now citing concern about the comfort of their passengers in the form of a short skirt.

Nice.

Kim
http://whats-next.typepad.com

Elana Centor 5 pts

I don't think companies have the right to refuse business to anyone--that would be called discrimination and I do believe we have some laws against that kind of behavior.

Companies, within reason, can set parameters --like the saggy pants and backward caps but as Laurie shared, in her experience "saggy pants" is code for young black men and that would be discrimination.

If Southwest Airlines wants us to start wearing our Sunday Best and white gloves then tell us. We will decided if we want to fly their airlines.
What I didn't include in my original post is thaton the flight home , the flight attendants at SWA complimented her on the exact same outfit.

I wasn't there.I have no idea what her skirt was and wasn't revealing. Where I strongly disagree with you is that companies need to make the policies known ahead of time. I nor Kyla Ebbert can conform with a dress code unless we know about ahead of time( see the vatican).

This incident follows on the heels of the flight attendant who forced the woman with the crying child off the plane --- I truly didn't know airlines could do that. If airlines removed every crying child from the airlines there would be a lot more available seats.

For me, the real story is that Southwest didn't apologize and seems to be defending its actions which does seem out of character for its corporate personality.

It's not okay to single out one passenger,on one flight where other passengers on other flights wearing very similar outfits are allowed to board without incident.That is discrimination.

elana
Blogher Contributing Editor,Business&CareersFunnyBusiness ( http://funnybusiness.typepad.com/funnybusiness )

Melanie Nelson 5 pts

I have to respectfully disagree with your post. I don’t believe that SWA owes this woman an apology for anything. I think all businesses hold the “right to refuse service to anyone” and she fit that bill--whether the dress code was posted or not.

If you look at her picture you can see that where she has the skirt (after she pulled it down) would have to be about the middle of her butt. In response to your comment above, I think no matter what your angle was you’d be treated to some sort of view (before she pulled it down).

As for calling SWA hypocritical because of what attendants wore 20 years ago, I think that’s reaching. SWA’s policy has clearly come a long way and now they would like their patrons to show the same respect. Besides, in the picture you show, I’d bet everything that those hotpants are STILL longer than that skirt before she pulled it down.

Chilihead
Don't Try This at Home ( http://donttryit.com )

Elana Centor 5 pts

It's a style I just don't get, but then I'm 56. My son who is college educated and some might say privileged is a devotee of that style -- because of that I think of it as generational. Eager to hear what others have to say.... I just thought some places are sick of looking at these guys underwear.

elana
Blogher Contributing Editor,Business&CareersFunnyBusiness ( http://funnybusiness.typepad.com/funnybusiness )

laurie 5 pts

When a sign says, "no sagging pants and ball caps forward" what are they really saying. My spouse and I saw a couple of signs like that in Chicago and interpreted it as, "no young, black men."

Does anyone else feel there are some racist overtones here?

laurie
www.notjustaboutcancer.blogspot.com ( http://www.notjustaboutcancer.blogspot.com )

Elana Centor 5 pts

The real issue is not knowing "the rules" or as they say in corporate america - the policy. a policy is nothing more than a decision made ahead of time . When a person breaks the rules, its assumed they knew the rules in the first place.

Just tell me the rules. If I don't like them, I'll give my business to a company that bettermatches my tolerance for their rules.

elana
Blogher Contributing Editor,Business&CareersFunnyBusiness ( http://funnybusiness.typepad.com/funnybusiness )

Bridget Magnus 5 pts

Actually, I went on for quite a while yesterday about this very issue ( http://shortwoman.com/?p=497 ). Long story short, I don't have a problem with rules, as long as they can be known and are evenly applied. That is, post a friggin sign!

And that goes for the TSA too.....