The Fashion world has a reputation for swollen egos and offensive attitudes though it is by no means fair to characterize everyone into fashion in this way. Recently however, I had the misfortune of stepping into a small and new'ish fashion store on 197 Karangahape Road in central Auckland - Vickie Sudarath.
The people who work in there are offensive to the extreme and appear to have enough ego to fill the entire shop to overflowing. I have never encountered such rude salespeople... possibly one of them was Vickie herself. In any case, it was enough to put me and my friends off shopping there. I would advise against going in there as it is bound to put a dampener on your day. Furthermore, the clothing is neither fashionable nor well made.
As a comparison, I have always had excellent and friendly service from Rei Kawakubo's
Dover Street Market flagship store in London. If anyone can get away with ego, it should be Kawakubo but surprisingly, everyone at CDG is so friendly.
More generally, New Zealand offers very little in terms of fashion, particularly for men. The fashion world here is like the art circuit here... small, insular, and full of inflated egos with little substance to show for it.
