Cookie Policy | How MUNICIPAL Uses Cookies

1. Who we are and what this policy covers

This Cookie Policy is issued by MUNICIPAL Apparel Company LLC ("MUNICIPAL," "we," "us," or "our"), 1722 South Coast Hwy, Ste 2, Oceanside, CA 92054. It explains how we use cookies and similar technologies on municipal.com (the "Site"), what those technologies do, how long they remain on your device, and the choices you have about them.

This Cookie Policy forms part of our Privacy Policy, which describes more broadly how we collect, use, and disclose personal information. Where the two documents address the same subject, this Cookie Policy governs with respect to cookies and similar technologies. Terms such as "personal information," "sale," "sharing," and "targeted advertising" carry the meanings given to them under the privacy laws that apply to you, including the California Consumer Privacy Act as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act (together, the "CCPA"), comparable laws in other U.S. states, the EU and UK General Data Protection Regulation (the "GDPR"), and the UK Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations.

If you have questions about this policy or about how we use cookies, contact us at privacy@municipal.com or by mail at the address above, marked to the attention of the Privacy team.

2. What cookies and similar technologies are

A cookie is a small text file that a website places on your computer or mobile device when you visit. Cookies allow a website to recognize your device, remember information about your visit, and distinguish you from other visitors. Cookies set by the website you are visiting are called first-party cookies; cookies set by a different company through that website are called third-party cookies. On this Site, first-party cookies are set by us or by Shopify, the platform that hosts our store, and third-party cookies are set by the service providers and advertising partners identified in Section 8. Not all of their cookies are listed individually yet; Section 8.5 names the providers whose cookie names or lifetimes we have not been able to establish, says why those cookies are not listed, and says why we cannot promise that list of providers is complete.

Cookies differ in how long they last. Session cookies are deleted when you close your browser. Persistent cookies remain on your device until they expire or until you delete them; the expiration period for each persistent cookie is stated in Section 8. A persistent cookie may be renewed each time you visit, so the period shown is measured from your most recent visit.

We also use technologies that work in a similar way to cookies and that the law generally treats in the same way. A pixel (also called a web beacon or tracking pixel) is a small piece of code or a transparent image embedded in a web page that reports to its owner that the page was loaded, together with information such as the time, your IP address, and the cookies already on your device. Local storage and session storage are areas of your browser in which a website can store information that is not sent to the server with every request. Software development kits and tag managers are scripts that load and coordinate other cookies and pixels. Throughout this policy, "cookies" refers to all of these technologies unless we say otherwise.

3. Why we use cookies

We use cookies for four purposes. Each cookie on the Site is assigned to one of these four categories, and the category determines whether the cookie is set automatically or only with your permission.

Necessary cookies are required for the Site to function and cannot be switched off through our cookie banner. They keep items in your shopping bag as you move between pages, keep you signed in to your account, carry your order through checkout, protect the Site against fraud and abuse, and record the cookie choices you have made so that we do not ask you again on every page. Because these cookies are essential to providing the service you have requested, the law does not require your consent for them. You can block them through your browser settings, but if you do, parts of the Site, including the shopping bag and checkout, will not work.

Analytics cookies help us understand how visitors use the Site: which pages are viewed, how visitors move between them, where they encounter problems, and how they arrived at the Site. We use this information in aggregate to diagnose errors, measure the performance of the Site, and improve its design. Some analytics tools record anonymized representations of how a visitor interacts with a page, such as scrolling and clicking, to show us where a page is confusing; these recordings mask any text you type.

Marketing cookies are used by us and by our advertising partners to build a profile of your interests and show you advertising that is relevant to you on this Site and on other websites and apps, to measure whether our advertising is effective, to limit how often you see the same advertisement, and to attribute a purchase to an affiliate or creator partner who referred you to us. Marketing cookies are set by third parties and allow those parties to recognize your device across the websites on which they operate. Disclosing information to advertising partners through marketing cookies may constitute a "sale" or "sharing" of personal information, or "targeted advertising," under the CCPA and other U.S. state privacy laws. We do not exchange your personal information for money.

Preference cookies remember choices you make on the Site, such as the sizing unit you selected in the size guide, or a message you dismissed, so that you do not have to make them again on each visit.

How your choice takes effect differs slightly between these categories. Analytics and marketing cookies are set by scripts that we do not load at all unless your choice permits them, so where consent is required nothing we load in those two categories runs before you have chosen. Not everything on the Site works that way, and the exceptions are described in Section 8. Preference cookies are set by the Site itself at the moment you make the choice they record, such as when you switch the sizing unit in the size guide or dismiss a message. That write happens whenever you use the feature that needs it and is not conditional on the cookie choice you have made, as described in Section 8.4. Your preference choice is carried in the consent record we transmit to Shopify and to the providers listed in Section 8, which is how it reaches the tools that act on it. One cookie works differently and we set it before you have made any cookie choice, where the Site's regional-store suggestion is switched on: the first time you open the Site in each browsing session we ask Shopify, the platform that hosts the Site, to estimate, from your IP address, which country you are browsing from, and we store that estimate so we can offer to take you to the right regional store and do not have to look it up again on every page. That stored estimate is deleted when you close your browser, so the lookup happens again on the first page you open in your next browsing session. Because it records a country we detected rather than one you chose, and because we use it to serve you the correct store, we treat it as a necessary cookie and list it in Section 8.1 rather than with the preference cookies; Section 8 describes the lookup itself. Necessary cookies are set in every case, as described above.

4. How we ask for and record your consent

When you first visit the Site, a banner tells you that we use cookies and gives you a choice. Selecting Accept all allows cookies in all four categories. Selecting Reject non-essential allows only necessary cookies, with the three exceptions described in Section 8. Where the law requires your consent before non-essential cookies are set, which is described in Section 6, the two options are presented as buttons of the same size and style, with equal prominence. In regions where cookies are set unless you object, including the United States, the two options sit side by side and each takes a single selection, but the accept option is drawn as a filled button and the reject option as an outlined one. In every region, rejecting takes no more steps than accepting and neither option is placed behind an additional screen. You are not required to make a choice in order to use the Site, and we do not treat continued browsing, scrolling, or closing the banner as consent.

Your choice is recorded in a first-party cookie set by Shopify (_tracking_consent) and applies to the browser and device on which you made it. If you visit the Site from a different browser or device, or after clearing your cookies, we will ask again. Your choice is retained for one year from the date you made or last updated it. If we make a material change to this policy, we will ask for your consent again the next time you visit.

Where a partner receives information about your activity from Shopify's servers rather than directly from your browser, Shopify transmits your consent status alongside that information so that the partner can honor it.

5. How to change or withdraw your choices

You may change or withdraw your consent at any time, and withdrawing consent is as easy as giving it. There are several ways to do so.

Cookie Settings. Select Cookie Settings in the footer of any page of the Site, or use the button immediately below. Either one opens our cookie preferences panel, which shows the choice currently on record for this browser, the date on which you made it, and, if your browser sent a privacy signal that we honored, a confirmation that we received and applied it. You can change any category there and save. Your new choice takes effect immediately, and cookies in any category you have withdrawn will no longer be set, with the three exceptions described in Section 8. Cookies already on your device from an earlier choice remain until they expire or until you delete them through your browser.

Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. Residents of California and other U.S. states that provide this right may opt out of the sale or sharing of their personal information, and of its use for targeted advertising, by selecting Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information in the Site footer, which leads to our data sharing opt-out page. Opting out on that page records your choice for the browser and device you are using, and we carry that choice in the consent signals the Site sends to the advertising tools it loads, which restricts the use of your personal information for the sale or sharing of that information and for advertising personalization. It does not by itself keep cookies from being set: the control that governs whether cookies in a category are set is Cookie Settings, and what changing your choice there does is described above in this section. If you have an account with us or provide your email address on that page, we also apply the opt-out to the personal information associated with that email address.

Global Privacy Control. We honor the Global Privacy Control ("GPC") signal. GPC is a setting available in certain browsers and browser extensions that communicates your preference to opt out of the sale and sharing of your personal information. If your browser sends the GPC signal while you are in a jurisdiction that recognizes it, we treat the signal as a valid opt-out request for that browser without any further action on your part, and we confirm that we have done so. Information about enabling GPC is available at globalprivacycontrol.org.

Your browser. All major browsers allow you to view, delete, and block cookies through their settings, either for all websites or for particular sites. Instructions are available in the help section of your browser. Blocking all cookies will prevent necessary cookies from being set and will affect the operation of the Site as described in Section 3.

Directly with our partners. Many of our advertising partners offer their own opt-out mechanisms, which are linked in Section 8. You may also opt out of interest-based advertising from participating companies through the Digital Advertising Alliance at optout.aboutads.info, the Network Advertising Initiative at optout.networkadvertising.org, and, for Europe, the European Interactive Digital Advertising Alliance at youronlinechoices.eu. These mechanisms rely on cookies of their own, so deleting your cookies will also delete the opt-out.

6. Additional information for visitors in specific regions

European Economic Area and United Kingdom. If you are visiting from the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, we set only necessary cookies until you have given your consent, with the three exceptions described in Section 8. Our legal basis for setting analytics and marketing cookies is your consent under Article 6(1)(a) of the GDPR and the applicable national rules implementing Article 5(3) of the ePrivacy Directive, and we do not rely on legitimate interests as a basis for those two categories. Preference cookies are described separately in Section 8.4, because the Site writes them at the moment you use the feature that needs them rather than after you have accepted cookies; you can remove them at any time as described in Section 5. You have the right to withdraw consent at any time as described in Section 5, and withdrawal does not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before you withdrew. You also have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, portability, and objection described in our Privacy Policy, and the right to lodge a complaint with your national supervisory authority. Because our store is hosted by Shopify, information about Shopify's processing and the means to exercise your rights against Shopify are available at privacy.shopify.com.

United States. If you are visiting from the United States, the Site sets cookies in all four categories unless you reject non-essential cookies in the banner, with the three exceptions described in Section 8. Residents of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Montana, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and other states with comparable laws have the right to opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information and its use for targeted advertising, which they may exercise as described in Section 5, including through the Global Privacy Control signal. We do not discriminate against you for exercising these rights. An authorized agent may submit an opt-out request on your behalf by writing to privacy@municipal.com. Further information about your rights under the CCPA, including the right to know and the right to delete, is set out in our Privacy Policy.

Other regions. If you are visiting from elsewhere, the Site sets cookies in all four categories unless you reject non-essential cookies in the banner, with the three exceptions described in Section 8, and you may change your choice at any time under Cookie Settings.

7. Shopify's role and where your information is stored

The Site is built on Shopify, a commerce platform operated by Shopify Inc. and its affiliates. Shopify hosts the Site and processes personal information on our behalf as our service provider, and the information associated with our store is stored in the United States. If you are visiting from outside the United States, your information will be transferred to and processed in the United States, where privacy laws may differ from those in your country. Shopify maintains safeguards for such transfers, including the European Commission's standard contractual clauses, as described in its privacy documentation.

Shopify also processes certain information from our store on its own behalf, as an independent controller, to operate, secure, and improve its platform and to provide services to merchants and shoppers across the Shopify ecosystem. That processing is governed by Shopify's Consumer Privacy Policy rather than by this policy. Your choices under Section 5 apply to Shopify's own processing where the law requires it.

8. The cookies we use

The tables below list the cookies we have been able to identify and describe in full as of the date at the top of this policy, grouped by category. Some of the providers named in this policy do not publish the names or the lifetimes of the cookies they set, and we do not list those cookies individually until we have confirmed them; Section 8.5 names the providers whose cookie names or lifetimes we have not been able to establish, says why we cannot promise that list is complete, and says what we are doing about it. For each, we identify the party that sets it, its purpose, and the maximum period for which it remains on your device. Where a third party sets the cookie, we link to that party's privacy policy, which describes its own use of the information it collects and, where available, its opt-out mechanism. We review this list whenever we add or remove a tool and update it accordingly; minor corrections such as a renamed cookie do not constitute a material change to this policy.

8.1 Necessary cookies

A note about how we work out which country you are in. Where the Site's regional-store suggestion is switched on, we work this out the first time you open the Site in each browsing session, before you have made any cookie choice: we ask Shopify, the platform that hosts the Site (see Section 7), to estimate which country you are browsing from. Shopify already receives your IP address in order to serve you every page of the Site; this request sends it to no one else, and Shopify returns an estimate of your country. We store that estimate in the country-selector__customer-country cookie listed above so that we can offer to take you to the right regional store and do not have to repeat the lookup on every page. That cookie is deleted when you close your browser, so the lookup happens again on the first page you open in your next browsing session. Where that suggestion is not switched on, no such request is made and no such cookie is set. We do not use it to identify you, and we do not use it for advertising. If you would prefer this not to happen, you can block it using a browser or extension that blocks requests of this kind. Using a VPN does not stop the request: it changes which network address Shopify sees, and so which country is estimated. You can delete the stored estimate at any time through your browser's cookie settings, described in Section 5.

8.2 Analytics cookies

A note about the search identifier on product pages. The Site writes the findify-rid cookie listed above on every product page you open. When a search on the Site led you to that page, it holds the identifier of that search, so that adding the item to your bag can be attributed to the search that led to it; when no search led you there, it holds no usable identifier and nothing is attributed. The Site writes this cookie when the product page loads, whatever cookie choice you have made and before you have made one, so it is written even if you have declined analytics cookies. It is set by us rather than by a third party, it is removed when you close your browser, and nothing about it is sent to our search provider unless you have allowed analytics cookies. You can delete it at any time through your browser's cookie settings, described in Section 5.

8.3 Marketing cookies

A note for visitors who have been here before. We previously used an advertising partner, Simpli.fi, whose tags we have since removed from the Site. Removing them stopped any new cookies being set. It could not delete cookies already stored on your device, because those cookies were set on Simpli.fi's own web address rather than on ours, and a website can only delete its own cookies. If you visited the Site before we made this change, up to two Simpli.fi identifier cookies with a one-year lifetime may still be on your device. They will expire on their own. You can also remove them at any time using your browser's cookie settings, described in Section 5.

Session recording by Microsoft. We use Microsoft Advertising, which includes Microsoft Clarity, a tool that records how visitors move through the Site, including pages viewed, clicks, scrolling and mouse movement, so we can see where the Site is difficult to use. Microsoft loads this tool through Microsoft's own connection to our store rather than through the cookie controls on this Site, and it currently runs even for visitors who have declined non-essential cookies. We are addressing this with Microsoft. Until it is resolved, you can stop it by using the opt-out controls described in Microsoft's privacy statement, or by using a browser or extension that blocks it.

8.4 Preference cookies

A note about when these are set. The Site writes the cookies in this table at the moment you use the feature that needs them: when you dismiss the announcement bar or the country suggestion, or choose a sizing unit in the size guide. That write happens whatever cookie choice you have made and before you have made one, so these cookies are set even if you have declined non-essential cookies. Each one records only the choice you just made, none of them is used to identify you or for advertising, and you can delete them at any time through your browser's cookie settings, described in Section 5.

8.5 Cookies we cannot yet list individually

A note about what is missing from these tables. Some of the providers named in this policy do not publish the names of the cookies they set, or how long those cookies stay on your device. Where we have not been able to establish both, we have chosen not to guess, so those cookies are not listed individually in the tables above. The providers we know this affects include Hotjar, Findify, Awin, Flip, MNTN, Klaviyo, Microsoft and Elevar; in Elevar's case the analytics table above lists cookies that another provider sets through Elevar, while Elevar's own cookies are not listed. Simpli.fi belongs on that list too: we have removed its tags from the Site, and any of its cookies still left on your device are described in the note for returning visitors in Section 8.3 above. We cannot tell you that this is every provider affected, because some tags reach the Site through apps connected to our store rather than through the Site's own code, so it is the list we have been able to identify. We are identifying the cookies each of them sets by observing them directly on the Site, and we add each one to the tables above as we confirm it.

9. Changes to this policy

We may update this Cookie Policy from time to time to reflect changes in the cookies we use, in the law, or in our practices. When we do, we will revise the date at the top of the policy. If a change is material, for example if we add a new category of cookie or a new purpose, we will ask for your consent again where the law requires it. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.

10. Contact us

If you have questions or concerns about this Cookie Policy or about our use of cookies, or if you wish to exercise any of the rights described above, contact us at:

MUNICIPAL Apparel Company LLC
Attn: Privacy
1722 South Coast Hwy, Ste 2
Oceanside, CA 92054
privacy@municipal.com