The Origins of Fast Fashion Consumption
© Fashion Revolution
Today, April 24th, 2017, is the fourth anniversary of the Rana Plaza Collapse in Bangladesh. As reported on by the Guardian, working conditions at fast fashion suppliers for brands such as H&M, have not much improved since. Workers still work overtime to meet production targets.
Greenpeace has found that the majority of Germans know about poor ethical standards in fast fashion production, but continue to shop at these stores. With 455 H&M stores, Germany is the company´s second-largest market, only exceeded by 484 in the US. According to Euromonitor, the best performing brands in Germany in 2016 belonged to the fast fashion sector.
Shifts in Production
From 2000, pictures of fashion shows were increasingly published in magazines and online, inviting the public to participate in the world of fashion. Recognizing the potential of real-time data for tracking consumption, Zara and H&M began modifying their production structure. Manufacturing was outsourced to low wage countries and demand-driven flexible supply chains were established to ensure a quick response. These changes have led to a doubling of production within just 14 years. At the same time, people are wearing clothes much shorter than before – all at the expense of our health, the environment, and garment workers in developing countries.
With Greenpeace putting pressure on the industry, already 79 textile companies, with Inditex, H&M and Benetton at the forefront - have agreed to decontaminate their production until 2020. They will replace harmful substances that pollute rivers and drinking-water in the countries of production, with non-toxic alternatives. However, the NGO fears that the successes achieved by this initiative might become trivial, against the background of ever-growing production and increasing consumption. As Bruno Pieters, a pioneer of transparent and slow fashion brands in the luxury sector, said in an interview with the Telegraph: “But it will not be the government that will decide; it´s up to each and every one of us to make it happen.”
Dead End
German consumers buy on average 60 clothing pieces annually, says Greenpeace, but, as stated in a study by TNS Emnid for Bon Prix in 2016, most of women in the country still feel like they do not have enough choice. However, 86% of women own garments that they have never even worn, either because they are waiting to fit in or because they have not yet had the right occasion. According to Greenpeace, one in three Germans cleans out his or her closet once a year, to make room for new items. The thrown out clothes, 1.3 million tons yearly, either end up in the garbage or a charity bin. Fashion has become disposable, worth little more than a plastic bag.
Fast Fashion Environmental Impact © Greenpeace
Germany constitutes one of the biggest exporters of secondhand clothes, but importers, countries in the Global South, are no longer as willing to accept them. More than 42 countries have restricted, or completely banned, these imports. Apart from the fact that bad quality makes it hard to resell these clothes, the large quantities also harm the local textile industry. Whilst one part of the world can´t get rid of its non-biodegradable old clothes, employees in the other parts are working in inhumane conditions to meet the incessant demand for new and fast fashion.
Fashion as Self-Representation Within Society
Analyses of the causes of fast fashion consumption commonly paint consumers as marketing victims, or shopping addicts - but these are not the roots of the matter. In order to understand why people are prone to fast fashion, you need to start with the basics; What does fashion mean to Germans?
“Fashion plays an important role for our self-representation. Through the way we dress, we communicate who we are and who we want to be; as individuals, and members of a milieu with certain norms and values,” explains Prof. Dr. Carlo Michael Sommer, German fashion researcher, for Bon Prix. “We choose our clothes consciously to evoke certain interpretations. In a society, where everybody increasingly needs to present him- or herself as a ‘brand’, fashion becomes more than just a private matter for fashion lovers. It fulfills our basic social and individual needs.”
Clothes constitute an integral part of us, they are our second skin. Their influence on our well-being is evident in a study carried out jointly by Bon Prix and TNS Emnid in 2016. Out of 2000 German women, between 18 and 70 years, 77% state that some clothing pieces make them feel more self-confident. They also adapt to basic cultural norms and aesthetic ideals, as 86% of women try to be dressed appropriately for each event they attend. Why else would online-shops such as Zalando, Asos and Otto offer ‘casual’, ‘work’, ‘party’ or even ‘travel’ wear? As Germans continue to care about their look, fashion keeps playing an important role.
Fast Fashion – Capturing Desires
In today´s world, globalization, digitalization and technological innovation shape people´s thinking. By living in an era of individualism, materialism and constant change, consumers find themselves reinventing their identity and varying their lifestyles over and over again. People are curious to try out new things, experimenting with their appearance to communicate their personal development.
This is where the concept of fast fashion has come in. Dominating the German fashion market, fast fashion is present wherever you look; in most cities, there is a H&M, Zara or even Primark, and advertisements are predominantly by the same companies. The original discourse around this production system was that of a ‘democratization of fashion.’ The design of its supply chain, to be as quick and cheap as possible, makes a wide range of styles inspired by the catwalk available to people of all income classes. Market leaders Zara and H&M offer 24 collections per year, the cheapest t-shirts, from the latter, starting at 10€. This is especially appealing to the demands of German consumers, who, according to Euromonitor, are predominantly price-sensitive. With the gap between rich and poor widening in the country, the price is likely to remain important. Its visibility and offer, both in terms of choice and price, makes fast fashion appear as convenient to fulfil the individual and social needs that are associated with fashion.
source: AZ Foothills Magazine
Failing the Truth
As stated by Greenpeace, the majority of German adolescents has at least heard’ that workers in developing countries are exploited by the fashion industry, and ‘are conscious about’ their clothes being processed with unhealthy chemicals. Though, considering the same study uncovered that every second youngster wishes for more information about how and where his or her clothes were made, this knowledge can be judged superficial. As they explain that they have no access to these information, the main cause for their inconsistent knowledge is the lack of transparency that occurs throughout the fashion industry.
People´s knowledge of the problems with fast fashion is so low that it won´t encourage them to rethink their consumption behavior. They continue to consume fast fashion. Compared to their personal reality, where fast fashion appears as more convenient to support their identity construction and social interaction than slow fashion, the global reality of pollution and exploitation appears too abstract to have a decisive impact on this thinking.
The Real Fashion Victims
Garment laborers in countries such as China, which was, as reported on by Statista, by far the biggest exporter to the German textile and clothing market in 2016, work excessive, and often unpaid, overtime to meet the high demand. Being surrounded by hazardous chemicals and working on unsafe machines, their conditions are all but safe.
It is no secret anymore, that the fashion industry is the second largest polluting industry after oil. Through production, transport and use of clothes in terms of washing and drying, there are more than 850 million tons of CO2-emissions yearly. The CO2-emissions of Polyester, the most frequently used synthetic material in fast fashion, is almost three times higher than cotton.
As found out by Öko-Test, many kids´ jeans contain harmful dye, the scandal about carcinogenic amines found in the pants produced by Inditex being one example. Apart from these physical consequences, there are also psychological implications on consumers. As indicated in a study by Nuggets, a majority of women have developed an obsession-like consumption behavior.
Challenging Global Structures
As well as the work initiated by Greenpeace, the global movement Fashion Revolution carries out an annual Fashion Revolution Week starting on April 24th, the anniversary of the Rana Plaza collapse that happened in 2013. Their campaigns are aimed at both raising awareness within the consumers and motivating them to bring brands to task on social media, asking #whomademyclothes. As ‘the customer is king’, consumers have the power to initiate change.
The vision is to move companies to be more transparent regarding their supply chains. In order to assess transparency and improvements, the movement has partnered up with the co-operative Ethical Consumer to develop a respective index. According to their latest report, retailers such as Forever 21 and Mango got lower transparency ratings, while H&M and Zara set a good example, achieving higher ratings. With the highest scores being lower than 50%, though, the report concludes that there is still a long way to go towards transparency.
So, where can you begin the revolution? Try to grasp the global reality and use your power to trigger change, ask your favorite brand #whomademyclothes. During this Fashion Revolution Week, we will also present you people who have changed their shopping habits, slow fashion brands and other initiatives for inspiration.
© Fashion Revolution