Good morning,
This is the third round of our Strategy Management and Sustainability newsletter, curated by students for students of the Strategic Management Course at Carlos III University of Madrid (UC3M).
In this newsletter you will learn more about the Fast Fashion industry and what implications it has on environmental sustainability. You will discover what and how stakeholders are affected by a Fast Fashion business strategy, as well as possible solutions to these presented issues.
The following topics are also mentioned:
Human rights and impact on workers
Environmental consequences
Takeaways and recommendations
Clara Wolf, Kevin Licenji, Lisa Hardebring and Mattia Urgese
Strategic Management Students at UC3M
Today's newsletter is 1200 words, a 6-minute read.
Did you know clothing production is the third biggest manufacturing industry in the world and second only to oil as the world’s largest polluter? The world consumes around 80 billion new pieces of clothing every year, 400% more than the consumption twenty years ago.
The key problem is the speed and intensity of demand and production:
107 bln units of apparel and 14.5 bln pairs of shoes were purchased in 2016
The average American throws away 36 kilograms of clothing yearly.
The fashion industry is responsible for 8% of global carbon emissions.
Less than 11% of brands are beginning recycling strategies.
60% of fast fashion items end up in a landfill.
BUT WHAT IS FAST FASHION EXACTLY?
The concept of Fast Fashion is to “offer clothes that are made and sold cheaply, so that people can buy new clothes often” - Cambridge Dictionary.
→ For companies it’s about taking advantage of the latest trends that are being shown on the runways and quickly transforming them into actual clothes in stores. Therefore Fast Fashion is a profitability concept for the low end-brands that can mimic the products of the big fashion houses - but in a faster and cheaper way.
→ For consumers it’s about always having the latest trend updated and available in stores for a reasonable price.
The key to success in Fast Fashion is to have a well working and effective supply chain that manages to distribute new designed clothes out to the stores within a few weeks or even days.
Source: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/es-LA/dictionary/english/fast-fashion,
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/f/fast-fashion.asp
ZARA
When talking of fast fashion, there are some brands that are mentioned more often than others. The Spanish clothing retailer ZARA specializes in fast fashion, and is the biggest company in the owning multinational concern Inditex. ZARA has its market worldwide as well as online and the fast turnaround time is an important key in the successful strategy.
“Zara’s power and attractiveness to consumers is based on the constant newness of its clothing, which in turn creates a sense of scarcity and an exclusive ambience around the company’s offering.”
Source: https://research.library.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1044&context=international_senior
Successful fast fashion companies exist also in other parts of the world. American Fashion nova and Forever 21 both score less than 10 % on the Fashion Transparency index. The Chinese company Shein, known for their low-end apparel which is solely sold online, was given 1 out of 100 points in the latest Fashion Transparency Index report. Furthermore, Shein is known for subcontracting orders to small workshops which, apart from being often considered a fire risk, do not usually have any formal contract with the company.
THE FAST FASHION IMPACT ON THE PLANET
The speed at which fast fashion is produced puts massive pressure on people and the environment such as land clearing, biodiversity, soil quality and fauna. In Australia alone, more than 500 million kilos of unwanted clothing ends up in landfill every year.
How are animals affected by all of this?
In the wild, the toxic dyes and microfibres released in waterways are ingested by land and marine life alike through the food chain. Numerous scandals reveal that real fur, including cat and dog fur, is often being passed off as faux fur to unknowing shoppers at the point that it has become cheaper to produce and buy than faux fur.A massive waste of water...
The fashion industry requires about 700 gallons to produce one cotton shirt and 2 000 gallons of water to produce a pair of jeans. On top of that, it is the second largest polluter of clean water globally after agriculture.. Wastewater from clothes factories gets dumped directly into rivers and eventually into seas. In Bangladesh alone, 22,000 tons of toxic waste from tanneries goes straight into the waterways every year....along with environmental damages
Around 700’000 microplastics come away from synthetic fabrics like polyester and nylon every time you wash your clothes. The Greenpeace Detox campaign discovered 11 chemicals present in clothes production that are known to cause cancer and disrupt our hormones. Other studies have found that chemicals contained in children’s pyjamas can be found in the children’s urine five days after they wore said pyjamas for just a single night.
WHAT IS IT LIKE WORKING IN FAST FASHION?
Fast fashion companies impact garment workers who work for low wages in extremely hazardous working conditions and without fundamental human rights. Fast fashion also brings some societal problems, especially in developing economies.
According to some research, 80% of apparel is made by young women between the ages of 18 and 24 (Remake). 0% of Bangladeshi garment workers earned a living wage, along with many women who reported bladder infections due to a lack of bathroom breaks and managers forcing them to take the contraceptive pill. Moreover, the risk of losing the income by reporting misconduct, led to the increase of sexual abuses with 1 in 4 Bangladeshi garment workers disclosing some form of abuse (Oxfam 2019).
There are many examples throughout history, such as when in 2013, the collapse of an eight-floor factory building that housed several garment factories in Dhaka, Bangladesh, provoked the death of 1134 workers and the injuring of more than 2 500.
Link of the news here: Bangladesh building collapse
WHAT ARE THE SOLUTIONS?
Solutions must come from all directions. In fact, although the production process has a major role in this issue, the actual buyers of the products are part of it as well. Let’s see what the different actors can do:
Companies: advanced technologies such as RFID and IoT may help companies to better track raw materials and resources throughout the whole process, making it simpler for them to reduce wastes and to produce more efficiently. But even more than that, companies may try to make their products more durable, i.e. designed for longevity and accompanied by well-organized repair services.
Reuse stores where used garments can be repaired and resold might have a great impact on new sales too. These actions are all part of a circular business model (see picture below)
Also governments can help in this process. How? For instance, they can
Reduce VAT on repair services and on second-hand products
Set durability, quality and safety standards for new garments
Support investments in R&D
Increase taxes for landfill use
Customers: how could they be of any help to the process? Customers must be made more aware of their impact. How?
Waste prevention and waste separation & collection campaigns
Promoting re-use and sharing, instead of throwing away
Promote sustainable fibres
Increase circular textile awareness
Source:https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/textiles-in-europes-circular-economy
Many other solutions can be found and designed. Here we propose a TEDx by Fredrik Wikholm, who suggests possible actions:
A solution for a sustainable fashion industry | Fredrik Wikholm | TEDxGöteborg
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Instagram Sustainable Fashion Forum (@thesustainablefashionforum)
Documentary: The true cost
Other sources:
https://pebblemag.com/magazine/living/whats-wrong-with-fast-fashion
https://www.vogue.in/fashion/content/vogues-ultimate-guide-to-sustainable-fashion
https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/textiles-in-europes-circular-economy
https://www.sixthtone.com/news/1008472/The%20Shady%20Labor%20Practices%20Underpinning%20Shein