Growing up, my parents scoffed at name brands and I wore hand-me-downs pretty much my entire childhood. I was teased mercilessly.
Now, I’m super brand-conscious! YMMV.
Is the logo going to make the sweatshirt warmer? Less warm? Fancier?
It’s a sweatshirt.
It’s big job is keeping a person warm.
I’m a little surprised that there isn’t more in this thread about dealing with the peer pressure aspect. Some of the advice loses power if the kid is still being mocked by peers. Or maybe that’s another thread entirely.
Could be worse. My daughter just dyed her hair purple and blue because the fad at her school right now is for crazy hair colors.
Actually, I’m joking. A bit. Her hair is really really cute and I like it a lot. She presented me with a great argument beforehand - meaning she threw my own words back at me, the little scamp - and explained that her bodily autonomy and the relative lack of health risks from a salon dye job entitled her to color her hair any color she wants to. 
But we both know it’s really because her friends are doing it.
And, y’know, I’m okay with that. Peer group acceptance really is a big part of middle school development. And it’s a big part of adult life, if we’re honest about it. When you hold down a job, you’re going to be more successful if you follow the dress code and appeal to your peers and supervisors. When you’re dating, you’re going to be more successful at it if you appeal to your target audience.
Obviously, there’s a limit to this, but figuring out those limits is her job, with my guidance and advice. Will she mess up at some point? Absolutely. And then she’ll learn how to fix her mistake, whether that mistake is fitting in too much and squashing her individuality or whether her mistake is standing out too much and not getting ahead because she’s too weird. I can’t navigate that path for her. And I’d much rather she mess up and learn how to fix it in fifth grade, rather than in high school or on her first job. Little kids make little mistakes with little solutions. Big kids make big mistakes, if they haven’t been allowed to learn from little ones.
For a practical answer, I echo the idea of giving him a budget - or a gift card - and letting him figure it out. If he wants to blow it all on one sweatshirt at a department store, so be it. He’ll either cherish that one shirt and wear the other uncool shirts when it’s dirty, or he’ll realize he could have spent that money differently, like at a sale or a thrift store or on multiple not-so-cool-but-acceptable shirts. Every one of us had to figure that out at some point. It sounds like he’s telling you he’s ready for that lesson.
It’s probably important to keep in mind that most people on this planet don’t live in a Straight Dope “Why do hyoo-mons decorate your garments?” thread.
I’m not really understanding why he didn’t get a Puma sweatshirt. My parents had a similar mindset when it came to brand names but Christmas and birthdays were when they’d roll their eyes and go buy me the Express jeans or the Nine West purse or the Calvin Klein peacoat. Because it was supposed to be a time for special gifts that I really wanted and wouldn’t ordinarily get. Giving a generic no-name sweatshirt for a Christmas present was kinda lame, IMO.
And for all the logic about the Puma sweatshirt costing twice as much, well, congratulations, you’ve paid half as much but you now have a useless sweatshirt that your kid won’t wear, so you effectively threw the money away.
And I can guarantee that turning an elementary schooler’s brand-name Christmas sweatshirt desires into an object lesson about consumerism went over very flat and he probably didn’t get it or care. My mom used to tell stories about wanting Wonder Bread sandwiches instead of homemade, or cheap madras shirts like all the other kids had–the message she intended was “look at how silly I was, you’ll look back and laugh too” but what my pre-teen/teenager brain heard was “My parents did the same thing and I remember feeling mortally embarrassed but I’m going to inflict the same suffering on you because I suck.” I eventually did care much less about what other people thought, but it wasn’t until 17-18 and I had to come to it on my own. Being told I should not care so much just made me angry and resentful up until then.
Ha ha! You forgot about the part where I also claimed if he ever ended up with that Puma sweatshirt he’d surely wind up in an alley next to Sach’s Fifth Avenue cadging quarters from passersby to support his Gucci habit!
On a more serious note, obviously one Puma sweatshirt probably wouldn’t alter the trajectory of anyone’s life. But people that DO slavishly adhere to fashion or become spendthrift hedonists get there by acquiring certain patterns of behavior. Since we’re talking about kids at an impressionable age, the question is what can parents do to encourage healthy patterns of behavior.
But I suspect you already knew that.
Aw c’mon, that barely rates a 2 or 3 on my hypocrisy scale,
Chastising your kid for wanting a sweatshirt with a logo on it, while sporting a jersey with a logo on it rates pretty high on my hypocrisy scale
So what if the kid wanted a sports team jersey instead of a Puma sweatshirt? Would you be cool with that? Or would he be succumbing to peer pressure?
Depends what team, right? 
I agree with all of this.
I was in middle school when I started getting teased. Not just about clothes, but a variety of things. I knew I couldn’t change the other things, but I could change my clothes. So occasionally I’d ask my mother for “cool” shoes–particularly tennis shoes. I didn’t want to wear those white hightop Rebox-wannabe monstrosities, but rather something “cooler” and thus more expensive.
And yet my mother never relented.
I really wish my mother had let me know that there’s nothing wrong with wanting nicer things, as long as I paid for them myself. I would have gladly done extra chores and odd jobs around the neighborhood, if that option had been presented to me as a kid. But instead, I was lectured to about how Payless shoes are just as good as the Nikes I wanted and how silly I was for following fads.
Meanwhile, my mother didn’t shop for her own shoes at Payless. She shopped at Macy’s.
I don’t think I’m especially “consumerist”. But I can certainly sympathize with wanting a status symbol. Parents certainly shouldn’t bend at every whim, but I don’t think it benefits anyone to belittle a kid’s desire to fit in and be cool.
Yeah, this is horrible. If someone buys better clothes for themselves than their children, that’s a parenting fail.
I don’t think my mother is that unusual, though. I think most parents think they deserve better things than their kids do, if only because kids are notorious for breaking and losing stuff. But also because parents are the ones out there earning the money. I don’t think my mother would have been a successful real estate agent clomping around in Payless sneakers. So I don’t begrudge her shopping at Macy’s. But I do think she could have done a better job of not belittling my desire to do the same (at least in the case of shoes).
Plus, kids are constantly outgrowing their clothes. I can totally understand not wanting to put down $50 on a pair of sneakers that are only going to last a few months.
Well, maybe ‘fail’ was too harsh. I buy my kids’ clothes at the same stores I shop at. I wouldn’t buy a nice shirt for myself at Macy’s and then tell my kids “Oh, a shirt from Walmart is just as good.”
Yeah, I did. I have a kid. I also remember what it was like to be one.
I live in a diverse area with a lot of hippie parents. It doesn’t really help avoid the desire for labels or the “right” clothes…at best it maybe changes which labels are the desired ones, and sometimes they’re even pricier.
Yep. You might go from expensive Nike shoes to expensive gluten-free, fair-trade bagged lunches.
Either way, kids always notice who isn’t conforming.
I had a friend who allowed her son to dye his hair lime green the summer he was 13.
He had been hanging out with a not so great crowd, but he quickly realized that “the kid with the green hair” was noticed and reported on more than anyone else. He learned not only to stay put of trouble but to stay away from situations that could lead to trouble.
Total Win.
Unfortunately for the kids, sometimes its their parents who are the ones conforming.
I absolutely buy myself “nice” clothes and then shop for my kid at Target or Kohl’s. A shirt from Target is good enough for a teenager who doesn’t take the same care of his clothes as I do. It is good enough for a kid who is going to grow out of it in a few months or even a year. I think this is normal and nowhere near “parenting fail”.
It’s also one of the ways kids learn to take care of their stuff. You want a really nice trench coat? Ok, show me you can take care of the less expensive jacket you already have and I will consider buying you one.