Back in October when I was in Sydney for a conference, I decided to purchase a new bra. It cost AU$99, which is way more than I expected. For several years now I’ve helped out the US economy by buying bras and underwear at factory outlet stores like Jockey and L’Eggs Hanes…
Yesterday I went into a L’Eggs Hanes outlet store in Carlsbad, California. Not only did they have some bra styles that fitted, they also had a HUGE range of styles and sizes — a much bigger range than you see in Australia. And the prices were pretty darned reasonable — US$30 recommended retail, reduced to US$20 at the outlet store PLUS a ‘buy two get one free’ offer. I bought 4 and got 6 all for US$86 (including tax). Converted, that’s AU$124 for SIX. And I paid AU$99 for ONE in Sydney.
You’ve got to wonder why. The brands were the same, they’re all manufactured outside the US and Australia in places like Indonesia, China, etc. So how can the Americans sell bras at a reasonable price (even the US$30 recommended retail only converts to AU$43, less than half the price I paid in October) yet in Australia we pay an exhorbitant amount for the same piece of cloth likely manufactured in a country geographically closer to us?
Rhonda Bracey: At Random 
One of my friends with an even harder to fid bra size than mine* gets her Mum to send her bras from the US all the time.
Could always do like one of the magnets on my Gran’s fridge (and gran isn’t my biological gran, she’s my step-gran, and only in her 60s) – it says something like “I don’t wear a bra so that my wrinkles are pulled down”. 😉
Oh, and not that you want to know it, but my bra size isn’t that impressive. After moving from a C to an E and almost back again in the past three-ish years, I have discovered that in departments stores here, once you get past that C cup, welcome to grandma bras.
Grandma bras… tell me about it! All those pretty ones, coloured ones, etc. are out of my range. It’s beige, white, maybe pale pink, and sometimes black. That’s it.