Long lines at Latter-day Saint distribution centers and church-owned Deseret Book stores are gone. The faith’s online store is back up.
Still, some eager members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints may have to wait a little longer to get those much-desired sleeveless temple garments.
The new styles of garments, which are sacred and symbolic underwear that devout Latter-day Saints wear beneath their street clothes, were first announced a year ago for “hot climates.”
On Tuesday, they finally went on sale in Utah and across the U.S., prompting thousands of women — and a number of men — to run to their nearest “distribution center” to get the long-awaited clothing.
Others rushed to their computers and logged in to the church’s online store. But the website was off and on all day, overwhelmed by the voluminous traffic. While at least some stores limited purchases, much of the online inventory of the new styles was depleted by Wednesday and store shelves were empty.
Representatives from two Deseret Book stores in Salt Lake City confirmed that the smaller sizes of women’s open-sleeve garment tops “were out of stock” and that they had no information about when further shipments would arrive.
Some online shoppers eventually were able to place their orders at store.churchofjesuschrist.org, but after putting in a credit card number, they received an email stating purchased items were “temporarily out of stock” or “due to high demand, shipping will be delayed.”
Later Friday, the online store posted this message: “We are experiencing very high demand for the new garment styles, which has caused some products to be temporarily out of stock online and in some distribution stores. Online orders will be processed in the order they are received.”
When asked when the online store would get more, church spokesperson Irene Caso declined to comment.
Northern California resident Rachel Gerber, an instagrammer at LDS Changemakers, said that a friend ordered garments online Tuesday within minutes of the new products becoming available and paid for two-day shipping.
When the order arrived Thursday, Gerber reported, “there were no tops.”
Another friend “was at the distribution center in Oakland within 15 minutes of them opening,” Gerber added, “and they were already sold out of her size.’
The incredible demand is neither surprising nor unexpected.
Sydney Benavidez, one of the excited members waiting in line at Orem’s Deseret Book on Tuesday, summed it up. The new styles allow members “to keep our temple covenants and have more options to perfect the things that we can wear.”
In her mind, they are a win-win. Now, multitudes of members just have to wait, wait.