Get your (petite) elbows up, Canadians

I don’t like to get super political on this blog, other than with respect to issues of petite advocacy. But things have changed. With the recent trade war between us and our American neighbours, thanks to a certain orange politician’s tariff-related temper tantrums and constant threats on our sovereignty, most of us are changing our shopping habits to avoid buying American products and to favour homegrown businesses. Whether we’re making a patriotic statement, or just making more sensible financial choices, Canadians from coast to coast are uniting in this respect.

We petites are no exception. As shorter humans, we’re probably even more sensitive than most to the perils of being bullied. Half of Canadian women are 5’4″ and under. and on this issue, we’re standing shoulder to shoulder with our taller compatriots.

Personally in the past couple of months, I’ve cancelled my subscriptions to everything from Amazon to Netflix, banished US groceries from my cart in favour of alternatives, cancelled US travel plans, and have been looking for Canadian and local sources for just about everything I regularly purchase.

The challenge of being a petite Canadian

But buying clothes is tricky for us petite Canadians. It’s always been a real challenge to find petite clothing in Canada. We face limited selection, few items in stores in our size, and high shipping and return costs. A CBC article back in 2018 on where to buy petite clothes in Canada listed almost all US brands that ship to Canada, with one exception. The recent closure of Hudson’s Bay, which was one of the last remaining Canadian retailers to sell petites, has made it even tougher.

As a result, many of us have been cross-border shopping for years, relying on lower prices and better selection across the US border. I even published a cross-border shopping guide here on this blog a few years back, before all these latest political shenanigans. Up until recently, it just made sense: It was cheap, convenient, and — provided you stayed out of the country for at least 48 hours — often duty free.

Well, not anymore. The political landscape has changed, and we petites need to change with it. So with that in mind, I’ve decided to revisit our homegrown Canadian brands and retailers to provide some guidance to petite women looking to Buy Canadian.

True Made in Canada brands

The Canadian manufacturing industry is unfortunately not anything near what it used to be. I come from a family that worked in Montreal’s Chabanel-based schmata industry for generations, and witnessed its move overseas in the 80s and 90s. Unfortunately, clothing brands that actually do all of their manufacturing here in Canada are few and far between. And while a small number of slow fashion brands have launched here in recent years, most of them have very limited sizing and don’t carry or sell petite sizes.

Miik

Miik is a Toronto-based sustainable, Canadian, women-run clothing brand. Founded by Donna Smith in 2010, Miik advertises that they produce all their styles in the GTA, within 50km of their studio. They have a small collection of petite items (18 at last count) proportioned for women under 5’4″.

Like most made in Canada slow fashion brands, Miik’s items are on the pricey side, with prices usually starting at around $150 per item and going up from there. I haven’t actually tried any of Miik’s items — from the website, the styles look a bit on the basic side — though I’ll be sure to update this post with a review of fit and fabrics if I do.

Shipping costs $9 CAD flat, or is free for orders over $200. Returns can be made within 30 days, with return shipping labels provided at the buyer’s expense. There’s also the option to shop in-person at their Toronto location, though I haven’t tried that since I live in Montreal.

Shortlisted

This one is a newly-launched project out of Vancouver. Petite founder Miranda Sam, frustrated by the lack of petite-friendly clothing options available locally, decided to launch her own petite line. Designed and produced entirely in Canada, Shortlisted’s clothes have an inclusive range from petite XS to 3X, using sustainable fabrics like linen and cotton.

Shortlisted is in pre-launch phase with only two items available thus far: A pair of wide-legged high waisted trousers, and a crop tank top, sold as a matching “jumpset”:

Miranda, who is 5’1″ like me, is also very active on social media doing a lot of petite advocacy work. Her product line is still too new to be able to review or say whether it will take off, but I’ll give her a shout-out here in hopes that she has success with this project. Canada certainly needs more petite clothing brands.

Canadian-owned retailers

Okay, so there aren’t many options for made-in-Canada petite clothes. But what about clothes that are at least sold by Canadian-owned businesses or retailers? Surely, petites have some options here. And we do. Somewhat. But the offerings still ain’t great.

Reitmans

Montreal-based Reitmans is one of the few Canadian retailers that sells petites. Currently, their website lists 75 petite items, with sizes in some styles ranging from 0P to 22P.

Unfortunately, Reitmans has gone far downhill since the days when they had one of the most extensive petites sections in Canada. After scrapping their petites section altogether in 2016, they re-introduced a very limited number of items, mainly pants and athletic wear. Nowadays, they only sell bottoms, no tops, in petite sizes. (News flash, Reitmans: We petites are short all over, not just on our bottom half!) They also define petite as merely having an “inseam that’s 2 inches shorter” than regular sizing, demonstrating that they don’t truly understand the myriad differences between true regular versus petite proportions. Not great.

Reitmans is fast fashion; its clothes are mainly made in Asia, not Canada, the fabrics are usually synthetic and cheap, and the quality is more miss than hit. But prices are reasonable, and you might be able to find some wardrobe basics like jeans or joggers there.

Shipping costs $7.95 per order, and returns by mail are at the buyer’s expense. Items bought online can be returned in store, though initial shipping costs are not refundable.

Laura Petites

Laura is another Montreal-based Canadian retailer. The company, which also owns Melanie Lyne, has been around since 1930, though it has filed for bankruptcy protection twice in the last decade and is reportedly struggling.

Laura used to have an entirely separate sub-brand, Laura Petites, with its own stores carrying exclusively petite items. Well, alas, those days are no more: Back in 2015, Laura closed dozens of stores as part of creditor protection restructuring. Nowadays, its petite items are reduced to a simple filter on its main flagship website. Heck, there isn’t even a header for petites anymore (though one remains for its plus-sized collection).

They may be harder to find now, but Laura still has a decent selection of petite items in sizes 0-16P, including tops, pants, jackets, coats, and dresses. Laura Petites used to be one of my go-to places to shop for eveningwear or occasionwear; that isn’t really true anymore, but there are still a few items to be found here. They are also a decent place to look for petite winter coats, which can be really tough to find.

Jumping on the patriotic bandwagon, Laura also released a Made in Canada collection of a few items that are produced here, including a few dozen petite items.

The downsides abound, though: Laura’s sizing tends to run large, making it more difficult for smaller petites to find items that fit. The styles skew older and not very contemporary, the fabrics tend to be synthetic and cheaply made (LOTS of 100% polyester here!), and Laura has a weird affinity for large floral prints. If you’re looking for on-trend items, you won’t find them here, alas.

Shipping is free for orders over $75, or costs a flat $10 for smaller orders. You only have 21 days for returns (only 14 days for sale items or eveningwear), and returns by mail cost $10. You can return free in store, though there aren’t many Laura stores left anymore. Beware of buying items on sale, as returns of any item purchased on a sale of 40% or more are issued only to store credit, not to the original form of payment.

Cazza Petites

Quebec-based Cazza Petites, founded in 1986, was one of the first and only retailers to focus exclusively on petites 5’4″ and under. Rather than viewing petite women as an afterthought, Cazza opened stores that carried exclusively petite collections, which is refreshing in the Canadian retail landscape. Unlike other brands who don’t get this (*ahem* I’m looking at you, Reitmans), Cazza proportions its petite items accordingly, advertising that “from shorter inseams to tailored shoulders and adjusted sleeve lengths, every detail is thoughtfully proportioned to flatter a smaller frame.”

While they still have a few dozen stores across Quebec, Ontario, and Nova Scotia, Cazza (and its sister brand Zack’s) is today sold mostly online. The clothes, which include tops, tees, pants, dresses, and other basics, range in sizes from 4P to 16P. They even have a small Made in Canada collection, which includes about 20 petite items at last count.

Their clothing, unfortunately, has tended to skew to a much older demographic, favouring styles that younger women are unlikely to find particularly stylish. A quick browse of recent styles only served to remind me why I usually walked right past Cazza without going inside every time I was at the mall. The website redesign to combine with Zack’s also makes it difficult to be able to tell which styles are petite and which ones are regular sizes, requiring you to re-select the petite filter every time you click. Not great from a UX perspective.

Shipping is free for orders over $75 and costs $7.49 for orders under that price. Returns to store are free within 30 days of purchase, or can be mailed back at the buyer’s expense. Unfortunately, there’s no convenient return or exchange policy for online orders.

Cleo Petites

Cleo was another option for Canadian petites. Until recently owned by Comark, a Winnipeg-based company, Cleo, along with its sister brand Ricki’s (which I worked at back in my university days), filed for bankruptcy and closed all of its stores earlier this year. While it is still selling off its inventory online, returns are no longer accepted, and there is no more customer service being offered.

This is sad news for petites, as Cleo was one of the few retailers in Canada to have petite extended sizes that run from 00P to 20P, and to sell coats and jackets, blazers, and suits in petite-friendly sizes. Cleo also had one of the most comprehensive petite fit guides of any retail site, explaining petite proportions in a no-nonsense way that takes fit, proportion, and even pocket and detail scale into account. Preach!

RIP Cleo. We hardly knew ya.

Alternatives to buying Canadian

As you can see, there are sadly not very many good options for the fashionable petite shopper here in Canada. However, that doesn’t mean we are relegated to shopping at US brands, either. If you want to avoid buying American, there are still some other options open to us, including:

• UK-based petite-friendly brands that ship to Canada abound, and often can provide a convenient alternative to buying American.
• Asian brands are often petite-friendly, particularly if you’re a very small petite who is narrow in build. There are many popular Korean, Japanese, and other east Asian brands that ship to Canada. (I’ll look at doing a blog post on this in the future, though as a curvy petite pear, I often have limited success with these lines.)
• Thrifting or buying secondhand is an option for us petites; Poshmark Canada has a decent petite selection, though nowhere near rivalling what’s available on the US version.
• Tailoring, customizing, or even sewing your own clothes if you’re so inclined.

An appeal to Canadian retailers

Ultimately, buying Canadian still remains really really challenging for us petites. As Canadian retailers struggle to survive in this increasingly competitive landscape, I’d like to appeal to brands out there to be more size inclusive. We petites want to support Canadian businesses; we just need you to support us by offering clothes that are proportioned to fit our bodies.

Readers: Do you see (or own) a Canadian clothing brand that carries petite sizes? Do you see any brands that should be featured on this shopping guide, but that I’ve missed here? Drop me a line in the comments!