NEW YORK — The idea is as old as online shopping: Let people input their own preferences and measurements at a Web site, and a factory will custom-make them everything from slacks to sneakers to breakfast cereal.
But customization didn't catch on the way its early promoters hoped, in part because of production costs and customer confusion.
Now, online merchants are trying again, hopeful that streamlined procedures and a public that is more accustomed to electronic shopping will bring the success that eluded them in the late 1990s.
After a strong initial reception for its custom-made chinos program launched in November, Lands' End, the nation's second-largest catalog company, will be expanding to jeans this month at its site.
In the fall, consumers will be able to personalize men's and women's dress pants and men's dress shirts at Landsend.com — at a price of about 40 percent more.
Nike Inc., which in late 1999 began offering consumers the opportunity to change the esthetics of different types of athletic shoes, has now further expanded the program.
Starting this month, consumers can customize the function of a running shoe under Pegasus Air 2000, personalizing such features as the outsole, the amount of cushioning and the width. The personalized shoe is $90, about $10 more than buying it off the shelves.
In February eBags.com, an online seller of backpacks, luggage and other items, teamed up with travel accessories supplier Timbuk2, to sell customized messenger bags. In June, eBags.com plans to introduce its own label of cases for personal digital assistants and other items.
Not everyone is predicting success.
"The Web is a great enabler of mass customization, but the problem is that it's fairly arduous for the consumer to pick preferences and for the seller to catalog all those preferences," said Ken Cassar, senior analyst at Jupiter Research.
He added, "For the most part, consumers are perfectly content with mass manufacturing. Most consumers don't need a mass majority of goods being custom-made."
He believes that customization works best with expensive and complex products like computers, pointing to Dell Computer Corp.'s success in letting people pick the individual features of their desktops and laptops.
Peter S. Fader, a marketing professor at University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business, noted that "consumers are extremely happy with fairly mundane mass products."
One shopper, Kenny Fried of Bethesda, Md., was moved to buy a $90 pair of personalized blue-and-red, striped Nike running sneakers, with his name inscribed. But he found the novelty wore off quickly, and things only got worse when his workout instructor made fun of his "wacky" designs.
Fried, 43, says he's toying with the idea of some customized golf shirts, but he's in no hurry.
"I am not going out of my way to find personalized products right now," he said.
Analysts say too many choices might confuse consumers, which may have been a factor in Mycereal.com's troubles. The site, set up by General Mills, was temporarily shut down last year after being open just nine months. It had let consumer create their own ideal cereals by choosing from a list of 100 ingredients such as honey nut clusters and whole grain oat flakes.
A General Mills spokesman, Greg Zimprich, said the site will be relaunched but no date has been set and a new format has not yet been determined.
"We want to put products before customers that couldn't get on the grocery shelves," he said. But he added: "It might not be customized cereal."
Others are pushing to make the idea work.
"We think it's going to be a big deal," said Robert Halloway, chief executive officer of Archetype, Inc., an Emeryville, Calif.-based technology startup company created almost two years ago to develop customized clothing.
The company's first partner was Lands' End, but over the past couple of months it has signed up with several other branded apparel manufacturers and retailers, Halloway said. He declined to name them, but said he expects they will unveil their own personalized services this year.
"Retailers that don't have a customized offering will be at a disadvantage," he said.
At Landsend.com, customers input a series of measurements, such as height, weight, shoe size and other body shape details. Once processed, the order is then digitally sent to its manufacturing partners, which individually cut and sew the product based on a computer-generated pattern. Consumers can expect a pair of personalized pants delivered to their homes within two to three weeks.
Regular chinos sell from $32 to $37. Custom-made versions are priced at $54.
Sales have been better than expected, according to company spokeswoman Andrea Stephenson, who declined to give specifics. She said the service was attracting customers who hadn't before shopped online for clothing, and was becoming a "top priority" for the company.
