The Navy is dealing with what could be called a sartorial crisis: The sea service has run out of pants. And it may not get more for months.
Specifically, service officials confirmed Friday that pants for the Navy Working Uniform, or NWU, the go-to uniform for most sailors, are out of stock at Navy Exchanges.
Courtney Williams, a spokeswoman for the Navy's Exchange Service Command, told Military.com that it is "experiencing severe shortages of NWU trousers" both in physical stores and online.
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Online out-of-stock notifications, which told sailors that the pants were "not available for purchase in any size" first made it to social media on Thursday.
Williams said that current pants stock levels are around 13% worldwide, and the exchange is focused on providing what inventory it has to new recruits at Recruit Training Command in Illinois, the Naval Academy Preparatory School in Rhode Island, and the officer training schools.
The Navy Working Uniform is one of the few uniforms that sailors are allowed to not only perform work in but also wear pretty much anywhere off base -- including to places such as restaurants and stores. As a result of this multi-purpose role, individual NWU components including pants and blouses are replaced more frequently because, unlike a purely working uniform such as coveralls, they cannot have large stains, rips or damage.
The issue appears to be coming from the Defense Logistics Agency, which manages acquiring and providing all the military branches with the myriad supplies and goods that they require.
Signs inside Navy Exchanges say that the shortage is "due to Defense Logistics Agency vendor issues." Williams said that they have "been in communication with DLA on a timeline for the uniform's production and supply chain."
The online out-of-stock notification says that more pants are expected in the first quarter of fiscal 2025, which means new items would hit store shelves no earlier than October.
Mikia Muhammad, a spokeswoman for the DLA, told Military.com in an email that while the agency has put out new contracts and expects initial deliveries in October, those will also go to places such as Recruit Training Command. Navy exchanges should expect “full support” starting in January.
In the meantime, both Williams and officials for the chief of naval personnel have said they are working to get word out to the fleet to keep the effect on sailors to a minimum.
Lt. Meagan Morrison, a spokeswoman for the Navy's personnel boss, told Military.com that the command has been getting word out to leaders in the fleet that, while the shortage is ongoing, sailors have other working uniforms -- such as coveralls or its replacement, the "2POC" uniform -- that they can be asked to wear.
The Navy is not the only service to experience shortages of key uniforms.
In April, the Marine Corps said that it was finally able to get more of its iconic woodland camouflage uniforms in stock for Marines after nearly two years of shortages.
In the interim, service leaders have been allowing Marines to wear the lighter-colored desert camouflage uniforms year-round instead of just in the summer. They also issued only two sets of the woodland uniform to recruits.
Editor’s note: This story was updated with a comment from the Defense Logistics Agency.
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