This is an adapted excerpt from “The Enshittification of eShakti,” by Andrea Grimes. It was originally published in The Flytrap, a worker-owned, intersectional feminist media collective founded in 2024.
Once upon a time, eShakti was a unicorn in the fast-fashion forest. Their offerings were both on-trend and classic, and great for workwear, vacations, and even bridal styles, especially for plus-size women like me who enjoyed their size customization options. Before my wedding, I bought a cream-colored 50s-style cocktail dress to serve as my backup gown, because I am both curvy and mercurial: I wanted options for my look on that day, the big day. And eShakti literally delivered. Even better: the company advertised its commitment to “the health, well-being, and ethical treatment of all our employees worldwide” on what is now a near-defunct website.
Today, I’m writing about eShakti in the past tense, not because the company flamed out in a spectacular going-out-of-business sale, or was subsumed in another fashion industry buyout, but because they seem to have just … stopped? … after a prolonged but mysterious decline. The first clear indication that something was up at eShakti surfaced in early 2023 with the beginnings of an online whisper network—though some of it involved all-CAPS ranting—among shoppers warning of delayed and unfulfilled orders. The eShakti site remains deceptively live; users can fill their carts with clothing and accessories only to be told “We are currently unable to process your payment due to technical issuess,” typo and all, at the final step. It’s a frustrating and cruel tease, especially in light of the untold numbers of eShakti shoppers who are still waiting on orders placed before the check-out function was disabled.
eShakti Was a Plus Size Pioneer
During its heyday, eShakti was hardly a bastion of plus-size representation, but at least it never played dress-up with the literal body politics of fat liberation (as Old Navy’s short-lived, in-store “BODEQUALITY” campaign did). If you couldn’t preview what a tropical-print wrap dress might look like on a size 26 body on eShakti’s website, you could at least see what it looked like on your body, in your own mirror. And for a lot of shoppers, that was a relief on its own: to simply not be marketed-down to with gimmicks and false promises. It was enough to just be able to order cute clothes in the right size.
Customization was a major draw for eShakti shoppers, not just because it’s nice to have clothes that actually fit, but because their made-to-order model signaled the promise of more sustainability and less waste. eShakti’s target consumer base is the ideal market for just that kind of thing: fashion-minded folks with more-than-Forever-21 money to spend, many of whom have been edged out of in-store shopping because of sizing limitations and low quality.
“Today’s plus-size consumer is in her 40s, she’s an expert, and she’s more discerning,” said Marie Denee, a fashion influencer and founder and CEO of the wildly popular site The Curvy Fashionista. That consumer, she said, is “more self-assured, and she can see through the okie-doke” from fashion brands making a money grab without investing meaningfully in reflecting plus-size shoppers back to themselves. And that was always kind of a weird thing about eShakti—you could order customized plus-plus-and-plus sizes from the site, but never see the clothes modeled on anyone besides a straight-sized, maybe even AI-generated, model.
Denee likened this marketing tactic to “dating in the dark,” saying “they’re afraid to be seen with us, but they’ll take our money.” She described eShakti’s apparent demise as, on top of everything else, a potentially missed opportunity to build on a loyal customer base that, fundamentally, just wants to be seen. If eShakti were to re-emerge and really build back trust with consumers, Denee says “they would have to over-over correct, and it couldn’t be for a season, it would have to be part of the integration of the brand.”
Of course, eShakti would need to be operational in the first place for any of that to happen. Whatever the cause of its decline—a profit-tanking pandemic, natural disasters, or some as-yet-unkowable secret third thing—eShakti seems to be in a bizarre kind of stasis for now. The site still exists, minus the check-out function.
Though eShakti never explicitly promoted itself as a plus-size fashion destination, it certainly sold itself as going above and beyond for its workers—indeed it still does, on a zombie “about” page. Customized clothes are nice, but back pay and benefits for the people who once made them would wear a heck of a lot better.
I bought about 8 customized pieces in early 2023. They were all amazing. They are my favorite pieces. Then I ordered a couple more and they never seemed to progress in sewing/shipping so I cancelled them and they gave me full refunds. Now, as you say, it’s basically defunct. I’m hoping they come back again. It was a great service. I would have paid more, frankly. I missed where you found evidence that the company owed ‘back pay and benefits’. To employees?
Hi there Lauren, that information was from prior reports that I can get the author to share with you. It is sooo shocking, indeed as we were in love with them! When we found out this information we were just as stunned and saddened to hear about all of this!