Dress for Success offers long-lasting solutions to enable women, breaking the cycle of poverty and helping women recognize their full potential while securing employment and obtaining safer futures.

But when you step into Dress For Success in Worcester, which is located at 484 Main Street, Worcester you do not see the typical setup for an organization that is volunteering its time, efforts, and money to those who do not have as much. Instead of racks of mis-matching pants and shirts, Dress For Success Worcester has created a boutique for women to find their perfectly fitting suit, accessories, and shoes. 

“You’ll notice that this is not set up like a thrift shop. That is on purpose,” Executive Director Justina Lachapelle said. “It was very important to us to give women the experience of being in a posh boutique and to have the staff attend to her needs and her needs only like you would in something like that.”

Suits come from donations from the community or Dress For Success’s partnerships. They are a mix of new and used items. For example, the organization’s partnership with Talbots allows for the group to receive new items, even if they may be “out of season,” according to the retailers.

Lachapelle said that over 60 percent of Dress for Success’s clients have never owned a suit. This means that the staff have to share etiquette around the clothing as well.

Dress For Success Worcester, which is a chapter of the global nonprofit, has been dedicated to the economic progress of women for many years now, but especially during the pandemic, according to Lachapelle, the support is more necessary than ever before.

“We’re looking to transform and support women,” Lachapelle said. “We try to teach women to own their strengths, own their branding.”

Half of the customers that Dress for Success serves were between the ages of 31 and 50 years old in 2020. 15 percent were over the age of 50. And slightly less than half of the women, 48 percent, identified as Women of Color.

Women have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately. Women are more likely to be low wage workers, which means that oftentimes they are the first to go to ensure financial stability for organizations. Women also disproportionately work in caregiver roles, which can mean with everyone home for the past year, they had to be the ones looking after their children and families.

“In addition to the gender inequality, we’re also looking at age discrimination. We’re looking at racial inequality,” Lachapelle said. “We’re trying to open the doors for everyone that comes through.”

As we enter Fall 2021, Dress for Success is seeing more people looking to re-enter the workforce.

“Our goal is to get women employed or back in the workforce,” Lachapelle said. “There’s a huge number of single-headed households and high levels of poverty. If we can help a woman identify her strengths, it helps her and her family. It also strengthens our community…Let’s stand together and help these women rise. We’ll all rise with them.”

The Suiting Programs allow for women to be styled head-to-toe by volunteers at Dress for Success. They receive a suit jacket, shirt, pants, shoes, accessories, and sometimes even makeup, according to Lachapelle.

“You want them to look at you and what you have to offer,” Lachapelle said. “If they’re distracted by bright colors or big jewelry – you want what’s on the inside to count. You want what’s on the outside to be the topping on the cake so to speak.”

Lachapelle said that one day she came out into the boutique area to find a woman sobbing in her suit.

“She said, ‘Oh my G-d. I haven’t seen her in so long,’” Lachepelle said. “It was just incredible. It was an incredible feeling.”

And this experience is for all people who identify as women, even if they were not born with the label. Lachapelle mentioned a transgender client who came in and was treated like anyone else would be, but their mother said that it was the first time that anyone saw them they way they wanted to be seen.

“She felt no shame in who she really is,” Lachapelle said. “It was like ‘yes! We did it!”

Once the women get the job, they can come back to Dress for Success for about a week’s worth of items. The staff also helps to advise the women on how they can mix-and-match the clothing so that the week of clothing can last a long way.

The staff also continue to ask the women about their work experiences and background, slipping in questions that may be asked of them during the interview.

Due to the pandemic, though, Dress for Success Worcester is still serving the community virtually. In 2020, the organization served 131 women in both in-person and remote suit fittings. During a non-COVID year, Lachapelle said that the organization serves over 470 women a year.

“We now do that remotely. It takes a lot more time since you’re dealing with someone over Zoom,” Lachapelle said. “One is for the resume review. Then we do a suiting tour.”

Beyond the Suiting Programs, Dress for Success also offers its unemployed or under-employed women other support programs, such as REAL Resume, I AM Successful, More than Money, and other mentoring and support groups.

I am Successful allows women to gain the tools and resources they need to re-enter the workforce. The ten-week program allows participants to explore their soft skills, as well as develop new social media prowess while developing interviewing strategies, career mapping, and goal setting ideas.

More Than Money helps women work in guided groups to learn about financial issues while becoming more fiscally responsible and independent themselves. This program is offered a couple times a year through corporate partners. In the fall, the DCU will collaborate with Dress for Success Worcester.

Through a mentoring program, women volunteer to support other women with career guidance. Some of the women in the program who serve as mentors had gone through Dress for Success themselves. Others are volunteers, and more are corporation supporters. 

Beyond the mentors, Dress for Success Worcester also has a coaching and career center, which is the most popular program within the organization. Women are able to access resources from reference materials to internet support and other ways to help her enhance her career development. Support is provided by the Dress for Success Worcester staff or volunteers.

There is also a professional women’s group that women can join once they are employed that focuses on job retention and career development skills monthly. This serves as a follow up of sorts, Lachapelle said, to the work that the women do in the Suiting Programs. Lachapelle said that a lot of the women have been part of the group since it started, which leads to them finding friendships and support with things beyond the job, including parenthood. In 2020, the 45 women in this group had a 95 percent retention rate. Dress for Success Worcester also engaged with 125 people in 2020 through this program. 

To support Dress for Success Worcester, text donate to 508-936-5539 or visit worcester.dressforsuccess.org.