Laura Kearney's family kept saying she was spending more on clothes for work than she was making at the mall. Then her paralegal sister saw an ad in a newspaper looking for Abercrombie & Fitch employees to join a lawsuit accusing the chain of requiring staff to spend their paychecks on the latest fashions.

	Lake Fong, Post-Gazette Lawyers Bruce Carlson, left, and Gary Lynch have been involved in a number of lawsuits against retailers who are accused of requiring their employees to buy and wear the retailers' line of clothes. Click photo for larger image.

Kearney, a former employee of Abercrombie's Ross Park Mall store, made the call to the lawyer's office but, in the end, did not want to pick a fight with the chain where she had loved working. Instead, she ended up as a lead plaintiff in a similar suit against the Express chain of stores and won a $3,000 payout as part of that suit's settlement.

Turns out there is a fine line between hiring people who love the clothes, buy the clothes and sell more by serving as unofficial clothing models, and creating an environment where workers earning barely more than minimum wage feel they have to spend their earnings just to keep their jobs. Over the past three years, specialty clothing stores such as Express and Abercrombie that blanketed the nation's malls selling "lifestyle'' fashions have spent millions of dollars settling class-action lawsuits over whether they made their employees buy their clothes.

The push began in 2002, when California labor officials announced a $2.2 million settlement with Abercrombie affecting 11,000 employees. It was a wake-up call for retailers, lawyers, employees -- and not a few parents of teens working at the mall.

"Until the Abercrombie case, frankly, most retail employees didn't know the law prohibited this," said Michael J. Walsh, whose Irvine, Calif., firm, Walsh & Walsh, recently worked out a settlement with the operators of the J. Jill stores in that state. "Most California lawyers weren't aware of the practice in the industry."

The case was triggered by a complaint from an Abercrombie employee, according to a spokesman for the state's Division of Labor Standards Enforcement. California has specific regulations stipulating that an employer requiring workers to wear a uniform of "apparel and accessories of distinctive design or color" must provide that uniform.

The seven-figure settlement got a lot of people's attention and several similar cases followed in California. Chains such as The Gap, Chico's and Polo Ralph Lauren all were hit. Any settlements affected just workers at California stores protected by that state's regulations.

Just as employees at the mall talk with people at other stores or even take jobs at competitors' stores, attorneys around the country pay attention to developments elsewhere.

Gary Lynch and Bruce Carlson, two 1989 graduates of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law who had built separate careers focusing on employment law, began to analyze laws in other states and in late 2002 filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania against the Limited. The defendant was later changed to Express, a division of the Ohio retailer Limited Brands, and the lead plaintiff was Rachel A. Pasci, an employee at the Express store in Robinson in 2002.

Without California regulations to lean on, the attorneys made the argument the federal Fair Labor Standards Act required employees to be paid minimum wage and that forcing sales associates to buy clothing to wear at work often pushed them below that level. During one week in August 2002, for example, Pasci earned $111.25 and bought $130.35 worth of Express clothing, the lawsuit alleged.

This was the case that Laura Kearney would end up joining, as well. At her sister's suggestion, she had followed up on that legal ad and talked with Gary Lynch.

Kearney had worked at several mall chains and generally loved her jobs, though the clothes she bought wiped out most of her earnings despite the employee discounts. "At all of them, we had to wear what the new stuff was," she said. "I don't think anybody ever bought sales stuff, either."

She was reluctant to sue Abercrombie but did bring along a letter from her former employer, Express, talking about the subject and saying employees didn't have to give any information to attorneys. "It kind of made me upset when I got the letter."

By the spring of 2004, the two sides in the lawsuit had worked out a settlement approved by the court. Express did not admit doing anything wrong. It said it had posted a memo in all of its stores in May 2003 clarifying that associates are not required to buy its clothing.

In a letter to employees, a copy of which was in the court file, an Express executive noted that while some people work at the chain because they like the clothes, "It's not why we hired you." The letter went on to advise where to call if anyone told them differently.

Meanwhile, Carlson and Lynch got involved in similar cases. An Abercrombie settlement affecting more than 30,000 workers in Pennsylvania, Illinois, New Jersey, Colorado, Minnesota and Connecticut was approved a few months ago in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania.

In the past few weeks, the two lawyers who formed their own law firm last summer worked with out-of-state firms to file complaints against Bebe Stores in a Northern California court and against Charming Shoppes, operator of Lane Bryant stores, in a New Jersey court. A Charming Shoppes spokeswoman declined comment on pending litigation. Bebe did not respond to a request for comment.

The same lawyers also are involved in a lawsuit now pending against Marshall retailer American Eagle Outfitters in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas. In its responses to the court, the company defended itself vigorously, saying sales associates regularly wear non-American Eagle clothes while working and that it gave the former employee of its Shenango Valley Mall store in Sharon who is named in the suit several items of clothing without charge.

Besides, the company said, the casual clothing and accessories it sells do not constitute a uniform.

Retailers might have a solid defense that clothes which can be used outside of work do not fit the definition of a uniform, said John Myers, head of the labor and employment department at Pittsburgh law firm Eckert, Seamans.

Myers, who knows and respects both Lynch and Carlson, thinks the legal theory using the Fair Labor Standards Act is questionable. "I think it would be interesting to find out how a court would look at that issue."

So far, retailers have shown a tendency to settle rather than let the litigation drag out long enough to get a ruling.

Despite the seven-figure settlements, the large numbers of eligible recipients mean no one is likely to get rich on the payouts, which may range between $100 and $300. Plaintiffs such as Kearney who are willing to be named as class representatives usually get more.

The awards have sometimes come as a surprise to the beneficiaries.

Pitt student Alicia Smith got a letter a few months ago notifying her that she was eligible to receive a gift card -- a common payment method used by companies to settle suits -- because she had worked at the Abercrombie-owned Hollister chain at Ross Park Mall in the summer of 2003.

Smith had not been aware of the lawsuit, but she opted to take the gift card. It took awhile to use it because she admits she does not really like the clothes at the retailer's stores.

The willingness to make gift cards part of the deals has taken some flack. Lawyers argue that many members of the class really want to buy clothes at these stores -- just not out of their own pocket for work -- and that retailers are typically willing to pay more in gift cards than they would in cash.

Then there is the always sensitive issue of how much the lawyers make. In the most recent Abercrombie case, the court approved $1.26 million for legal fees and costs, separate from the $3.6 million in expenditures approved to pay workers. They took cash, not gift cards.

An Illinois worker notified of the proposed Express settlement in which the attorney would get more than $800,000 fired off an objection to the deal, arguing the 10,000 employees in the class had been cheated both by the company and then the legal system. She later withdrew that objection, citing a talk with her lawyer over the applicable laws and the potential relief.

Lawyers, who worry about being painted as the bad guys, say the cases might never be brought or chain retailers convinced to make policy changes if individual workers had to go it alone. "Nobody's going to risk a job they want to keep for a claim of $100," said Walsh.

In addition, the monetary amounts involved are generally too small to justify an attorney investing long hours in research or even an employee losing several days of work while pushing a complaint in small claims court. "If the individual claims were larger, you wouldn't need to have a class action," said Myers.

Lynch sympathizes with clothing retailers who want their employees to wear the clothes. He thinks companies should consider just giving workers outfits to wear.

Even if that does not happen, those involved expect the lawsuits to start petering out in the next few years as retailers take steps to protect themselves and as time runs out for employees to take legal action.

Smith remembers her time at Hollister as a frustrating experience when she did not do much beyond fold clothes and stand around in the latest fashions. "You did have to wear all their stuff all the time," she said, though she managed to get by with a few things since she only worked once or twice a week.

This summer, Smith is holding down two jobs at the mall -- one at Wilsons Leather and the other at clothing chain New York & Co. She likes the clothes at New York & Co. where there are plenty of basics such as khaki pants and white shirts.

But right from the start, Smith said management made it clear employees did not have to spend money at the store. "There are days when I go to work and I have nothing of theirs on at all," she said.