Jeans Therapy

"I hate the fashion of today. I'm not even inspired to go into stores," Davis says. "Every woman has had that feeling of 'I know I can't wear that, but I'm going to try it on anyway.' I never feel like that anymore."

For a company like Liz Claiborne, creating a perfect pair of pants is good for business. A reliable fit can inspire rabid customer loyalty. But great pants also send a message to women: You have been heard.

Ostell has been on a listening tour all over the country to meet customers -- both current and lapsed. In Chicago this winter, the company gathered about 75 women from the financial services firm Smith Barney. The women represented all corners of the company, from mailroom workers to portfolio advisers. The fashion house didn't put on a traditional show. There was no catwalk. Instead, it felt almost like a PowerPoint presentation in an auditorium setting with Ostell at a podium and women sharing intimate details about their bodies, their lifestyles and their dressing woes: Their thighs are not lean; their hips are not narrow; their bellies are not flat. "A lot of women feel worn down by buying clothes," Ostell says.

What they're looking for is simple, says Thomas-Graham. They want the beauty of fashion but not the artifice.

The Rise and Fall of Liz

It used to be that women could rely on Liz Claiborne to produce clothes that were fashionable, reasonably priced and classic enough to last more than a few seasons. When the company was founded in 1976, it was known for providing women in their 30s and 40s with career clothes such as mix-and-match separates, tailored jackets and versatile skirts. The collection was never expensive by the standards of designer labels, but the quality fabrics, attention to trends and thoughtful details made it a modestly aspirational brand.

"The 1970s belonged to Liz Claiborne," says Elaine Lieb, 74, who was a longtime customer. "They were work clothes for working women. They were good-looking clothes at a fair price."

"I think that Liz herself was a leading fashion star as much as Chanel and Gucci," says Lieb, who has taught fashion merchandising in New York for 30 years. "People don't believe it because her clothes weren't as high-priced."

Davis, who lives in Michigan and has two children, works in sales -- a job that requires her to maintain a professional polish.

"My fondness for Liz is such that I worked there 10 years ago. I worked in one of their stores," she says. "I am still wearing some of that collection. There are pants I'm so upset about because they have holes in them and they're shiny" because they have been worn so much.

Over the years, the company grew into a nearly $5 billion conglomerate that today includes Juicy Couture, Lucky Brand Dungarees, Mexx, Prana and Kate Spade. But along the way, the flagship label suffered. The company's namesake retired in 1989. The brand relied on a design team, but it lacked a singular voice that could direct every element of an aesthetic vision -- from advertising to store design. By the late 1990s it was turning dowdy and stale and was overrun with pleated jeans, chambray shirts, pastel hues and the kinds of nondescript clothes that make a 20-year-old look matronly. Former customers point out that the brand's exuberant color palette disappeared. It no longer looked contemporary. It was too casual.

"They were no longer conservative. They were frumpy," says Kim Humphreys, 45, a corporate executive who lives in Greensboro, N.C. More than six years ago, she shifted her allegiance from Liz Claiborne to Talbots, Banana Republic and Dockers. Other former customers have gone to Chico's and J. Jill.

Net sales in 2004, for example, decreased by 18.7 percent from the previous year. Dozens of free-standing Liz Claiborne stores have been shuttered. (The brand continues to be sold through its outlet stores and in a steadily decreasing number of department stores.) It was a dying brand.