Putting new workwear through real working shifts

The question

A workwear brand was readying a new line of performance garments, in a new fabric with updated fits and features, and had to decide whether the line was ready.

Its lab tests could measure the fabric. They couldn’t say whether someone in a warehouse or on a factory floor would feel the difference over a long shift, or whether the garments would move, wash and look right in everyday use, and live up to what the brand planned to say about them.

Our approach

We took the test into the job, with people whose work keeps them on the move all day and who buy their own workwear.

Each tester first described the workwear they already rely on, then filed a short video and survey after every shift, with the order of garments rotated so none had the advantage of going first. The lab kept the technical claims, and testers’ own accounts were reported as a directional read to set beside the brand’s lab and wash tests.

What the team came away with

The decision on the line now had two kinds of evidence behind it: what the lab measured, and what a working day felt like.

From the shifts came testers’ accounts of how each garment performed and of its comfort, fit, styling and laundering, read by sector and for men and women, with films in testers’ own words.

Workers’ reactions to the brand’s planned messages, guidance on claims, and a prioritization of features by use and value gave the team more to weigh alongside its own tests.

Because every tester judged the garments against the workwear they already wear, the team could see the new line as its buyers would, against the clothes it would have to replace.