Iconic trouser and jeans styles of the 1990s are once again dominating the latest fashion – moving from the fashion pages to high streets up and down the country. And data from search specialists, MediaVision suggests that the 90s iconic looks are here to stay for the rest of 2022.
A new generation of consumers is going online to seek out a range of 90s fashion staples: search volumes for ‘cargo pants’ are up by 44% and searches for ‘cargo trousers’ have doubled (up by 97.5%) – comparing 1 Jan to 8 May 2022 to the same period in 2021.
Also showing a significant increase in online search volumes are ‘wide leg trousers’ (up by 69%), ‘crop top’ (up by 11%), ‘low rise jeans’ and ‘fanny pack’ (both up by 28%).
The broader term ‘90s fashion’ has seen approximately 1,214,000 searches this year. Compared to last year, that’s a quarter more than in 2021.
Whilst the major spike for 90s happened in November 2021, igniting the buzz of the 90s fashion resurgence, a spike in searches as recent as April indicates that the fashion trend isn’t going away any time soon.
After 90s staple ‘cargo pants’ became a viral sensation on TikTok, it was only a matter of time before consumers were running to search engines to snatch them up for themselves. The brand ‘Stradivarius’, whose cargo pants were the feature in one of the most viral videos under the TikTok hashtag, has seen a search increase of 57% in comparison to last year.
The analysis was carried out by online search expert MediaVision, using its proprietary Digital Demand Tracker tool that analyses search data from AdWords and Google Trends to get a blended view on demand changes by the week.
Major brands that defined the 90s fashion world, have also seen a rise in searches: ‘Converse’ has almost 3 million more searches this year in comparison to last (an increase of 45%), ‘Coach’ has seen an increase of 29% so far while ‘New Balance’ saw an increase of 57.7% – perhaps in part due to its popularity of its 860 trainers – a nod back to the 90s classic.
Louis Venter, CEO at MediaVision, comments: “For 90s kids, the fashion of the day was synonymous with the icons of the day – the likes of TLC and All Saints. Now it’s the turn of the next generation to borrow trends from millennials’ childhoods. With social media providing the reach, it’s easy for the next generation of fashion lovers to adopt the ‘newest’ trends.
“Fashion is such a fast-moving industry that even the smallest of references can have an impact on trends – such as the #FreeBritney movement, bringing 90s icon Britney Spears back into the limelight and exposing a new generation to archive images of the star at the height of her fame when she was the epitome of 90s fashion.
“Either of these could have been the spark that re-ignited the forgotten trends of the 90s almost thirty years later. Watching the trends blossom and take effect tells us that this is only the start of the 90s comeback, and we expect summer staples of the decade to be climbing up searches before long.”
