Casual Everyday

After 60 years, the Men's Dress Furnishings Association, the trade group that represents American tie makers, shut down this week. The reasons are pretty obvious: most men simply don’t wear ties anymore.

Association members now number just 25, down from 120 during the 1980s power-tie era, and according to a recent Gallup Poll, the number of men who wore ties every day to work last year dropped to a record low of 6%, down from 10% in 2002.

Of course, Father's Day this month means lots of dads will be adding yet another unused tie to their collections, but the future of neckties is shaky at best.

The more casual approach to work wear certainly plays to the hands of active and casual apparel companies, but in some ways it’s said to say goodbye to this long-standing symbol of manliness and formality. As the song goes: “Every girl’s crazy about a sharp-dressed man.”