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The West European market for women’s hosiery—comprising nylon
tights (pantyhose), stockings and hold-ups, knee-highs, and anklehighs—
amounts to 1.63 bn pairs a year, worth US$3.75 bn at retail
level. This implies an average unit value per pair of
US$2.30—although stockings are more expensive than tights while
knee-highs and ankle-highs are less so.
The hosiery market has been in significant decline over the last
decade. Between 1996 and 2005, sales fell by 28% in terms of volume,
and by 33% in terms of value. Several factors have contributed to the
decline, including the popularity of wearing trousers and jeans in
preference to skirts and dresses, the trend for more hard wearing
opaque products, technological advances in yarn which have also
made the product more robust, fierce price competition from
supermarkets which sell multipacks at low prices, and the movement
of production to lower cost countries.
In this environment most of the major brands and manufacturers have
suffered and there has been some consolidation of suppliers. Italy
remains the largest European producing country and its exports are
present in all the major country markets. The largest national market
within Europe is Germany, followed by Italy, France and the UK. The
only major country in which prices have not fallen is Italy—probably
as a consequence of its highly fragmented retail distribution structure.
For the future, further falls are forecast in both volume and value, but
they will be less dramatic than they have been in the last decade.

The West European market for women’s hosiery—comprising nylon
tights (pantyhose), stockings and hold-ups, knee-highs, and anklehighs—
amounts to 1.63 bn pairs a year, worth US$3.75 bn at retail
level. This implies an average unit value per pair of
US$2.30—although stockings are more expensive than tights while
knee-highs and ankle-highs are less so.
The hosiery market has been in significant decline over the last
decade. Between 1996 and 2005, sales fell by 28% in terms of volume,
and by 33% in terms of value. Several factors have contributed to the
decline, including the popularity of wearing trousers and jeans in
preference to skirts and dresses, the trend for more hard wearing
opaque products, technological advances in yarn which have also
made the product more robust, fierce price competition from
supermarkets which sell multipacks at low prices, and the movement
of production to lower cost countries.
In this environment most of the major brands and manufacturers have
suffered and there has been some consolidation of suppliers. Italy
remains the largest European producing country and its exports are
present in all the major country markets. The largest national market
within Europe is Germany, followed by Italy, France and the UK. The
only major country in which prices have not fallen is Italy—probably
as a consequence of its highly fragmented retail distribution structure.
For the future, further falls are forecast in both volume and value, but
they will be less dramatic than they have been in the last decade.