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Do you prefer to buy your swimwear online or from actual stores themselves? Do you usually buy them yourself or have you bought when you've been shopping with friends/partners etc?

I've only bought online, but only because I don't know where I'd buy them in person. I'll be sticking with online only since I'm a fan of swimoutlet.com's in house brand Sporti.

Depending where you live, shopping online is my only option. I have only once seen speedos at Dicks sporting goods.

Mostly online. Can only find speedos at sporting goods store, and the selection is usually very small.

I always buy them in stores so I can try them on for a proper fit.

Recently I'm faced with moving back to North America and I'm not looking forward to the lousy selection.

I like trying them on in the stores so I know they're what I want, but as electric2010 said, selection is typically very limited. The last few suits I've bought have been online because they were of a style I'd never be able to find in any store. Generally, a three-inch side speedo in either black or blue and not even in my size is all that many sporting good stores have in stock. Plus I think I'm saving money by buying online.

While I love to shop for swimwear (well any clothing really) in person, it is rather hard to find anything I like around where I live. Theres a few sporting stores that sell active/ competition briefs but those all start to look the same after a while. So anything classified as fashion or exotic swimwear I have to order online :(

Anymore it's a toss up because there's this great store in downtown Portland Oregon called Under U for Men.

They carry a large range of swimwear and underwear and they've got quite interesting locker room stylized dressing booths.

Purchasing online, you can only imagine how the fit comes out, but in store you can be confident with what you're getting into and how it'll look!

Usually online now. I still get a thrill from going into a store and finding a small collection of swimwear. Usually the styles are not very interesting. Had a couple of hot encounters (mainly conversations) while browsing when I was much younger, but now I'm of an age when such innocence would be creepy!

Unfortunately, the reality is that there is little or no selection of any Speedo type swimwear in many stores any more, so on-line is the only option. Yes, I do miss the days where there was a rack of a variety of Speedos in large Sporting Goods store and I could take the time to try suits until I found THE One that I knew I would be happy with.

That being said, buying online is sort of like Christmas for me. The searching ... selection ... anticipation ... and pure joy when the 'little package' shows up in the mailbox. Then the trying on ... Yeah, that's good too!!!

I always look into sport stores and surf stores to see if they do have speedos but the closest I've ever come to a decent pair are finding the three-stripe Adidas in Sports Direct. Other than that they have the Slazenger trunks which I'm not a fan of at all.
I remember there used to be a shop near me called Brand Fusion that stocked lots of different Speedo branded trunks but at the time I didn't really swim alot and didn't have a job to spend my own money on trunks. Unfortunately that shop closed and I haven't seen one about since.

I buy online, I'm part of all the mailing lists on Speedo, Arena, SimplySwim and a few select others and as soon as I get an email telling me they've got new designs in stock I get a little bit excited haha it's quite sad.

Edited.

jace wrote: very little selection in stores and they don't want you trying them on without underwear. How can you see how a suit looks on with a pair if briefs underneath?

I usually wear a small thong when trying on suits in a store ... because a thong is underwear, right???? ;)