This past week has been one of the most intense moments of our 2007 retail year: The Victoria’s Secret Semi-Annual Sale.

Imagine hordes of women (and a few brave men) ravaging bins and racks just find the perfect pairs of $9.99 panties.

I’m not judging. I was one of them.

Silly as it may seem to some people, lingerie in itself is actually a billion-dollar industry — in the United States. and England. What’s with the drive for such high-quality intimate apparel when fewer than 99 percent of the people you know will ever even lay eyes on it you ask?

Author and journalist Marian Keyes categorizes women into three obsessive types; bath product women, shoe women and undergarment women.

Shoe women I can understand. Women such as Imelda Marcos and Carrie Bradshaw obviously had an insatiable addiction to them. I don’t know if I thoroughly buy the bath product women type though.

However, there seems to be an incredible imbalance when it comes to undergarment women. I’m talking a scale- breaking imbalance.

I personally put the blame on the Victoria’s Secret’s advertising team and their sexpot models.

For example, last summer my friend Jessica decided she needed a swimsuit. With the two latest Victoria’s Secret catalogues in hand she ended up getting more than $300 worth of goods, which included only two actual swimsuits all of which were worn by model Adriana Lima.

Ms. Lima seems to be the favorite of the models, considering everything she wears seems to sell out the quickest. Not surprising, if you have ever seen her wear anything.

Another theory for our underwear fetish stems from an idea of a friend of mine. She states that having sexy underwear is just a state of mind. Even though you’re wearing a sweater and sweats, just knowing that under all those layers you look amazing makes it worth it.

I buy that theory. It is a universal fact that sex sells. It sells in movies, it sells in novels, and lately it has been busy super-selling lingerie.

Where you buy your underthings seems to be a bit of a cliché nowadays, too. Classy, uptown girls seem to purchase in places such as Nordstrom. The more adventurous, trendy girls seem to head towards Frederick’s of Hollywood. The practical girls appear to stick to bigger, diverse stores like Target and JCPenney’s.

No matter where you spend the dollar bills, it’s apparent that fashionable underclothes are becoming more of a necessity than an option these days.

So whether you’re a bra-matches-the-panties kind of girl or not, face the facts and at least give the name brand lingerie a try. Besides, I’m sure it will give the select 1 percent who do get to see that side of yourself a welcomed surprise.

— Jasmine Ines

jasmineines@thedaily.washington.edu.