| The current exploratory mixed method study quantified and explored customer leadership interest in clothing design. Questionnaires were administered to 529 web-based females aged 18 through 30 who resided within 30 miles of a major U.S. city. Over half of the participants (61.25%) indicated some form of customer leadership interest in designing their own clothing. When asked how customers should interact with companies in the design process, 28.17% of the panelists expressed company-directive, 47.26% indicated participatory, and 24.57% chose transactional leadership styles. Fashion design leadership interests demonstrated a significant association with leadership styles (chi 2(8, N = 529) = 36.01, p < .01). Participants who wanted to design their own clothes were overrepresented in customer-directive leadership, while non-self-designers were over-represented in expressing retailer-directive leadership. |
