They’ve got spirit; yes, they do!
This past weekend, thousands of Gen X shoppers descended on Costco stores nationwide to procure the discount superstore’s latest viral hit: Esprit sweatshirts featuring the same crayon-colored logos made famous in the 1980s.
Every colorway and every size of the fleece crewneck has already sold out online.
“Gen X, could we have ever imagined an Esprit sweatshirt would be $16.99 at Costco?” asked Michelle Jenkins, a former tech publicist who founded the West Coast blog Daily Waffle.
Jenkins posted pictures of the cozy retro top in three shades — cobalt blue with navy embroidery, chalk white with rainbow letters, and alpine green with white letters — to the delight of over 360,000 viewers on Threads. “My 14-year-old self is healing,” wrote one commenter.
“Not every Gen Xer ran to Costco and grabbed an Esprit sweatshirt. Some grabbed two,” wrote another.
Named for the French word for “spirit,” Esprit was founded in 1968 by San Francisco residents Susie and Doug Tompkins, who also created The North Face.
But it wasn’t until the 1980s that the labels’ iconic stencil-effect logo, created by Apple designer John Casado, transformed the brand into a must-have for preppy and trendy teens around the world.
Along with Swatch watches and Jordache jeans, Esprit sweatshirts were status items that cost around $45 back in the day — roughly $138 today. That means the tops worn by Lisa Bonet and Jennifer Connelly were full-on designer pieces, on par with sweatshirts from Aviator Nation and Fear of God today.
On TikTok, nearly half a million viewers followed a Salt Lake City shopper as she stumbled on a table of the tops in sizes XS through XL. “Oh my God!!! My mom could not afford those when I was a kid now that I have my own adult money I may be running to Costco!” said a hopeful shopper.
Esprit tried to stage a comeback in the early 2010s, but it flopped in the face of other mid-range labels like J.Crew and Rag & Bone, which then had a chokehold on the pre-pandemic’s more polished vibe.)
Can Costco bring back the ’80s look in earnest? Gen X netizens seem skeptical. As one wrote on Facebook, “I’m looking forward to Gen Z mispronouncing this as e-spirit.”
