You see a lot of articles talking about how appalling fast fashion is and how we should all buy ‘ethical’ clothing. In a previous post I have explained our approach to deciding if something is ethical enough to be sold through Ethically Clothed. This week’s blog looks at the other side of the coin, namely why do companies choose produce clothes using a fast fashion mentality?
From business and consumer perspectives it has to be said that there are advantages to fast over slow fashion. For instance in fast fashion the business gets a higher turnover of items allowing it to access a larger customer base, cheaper distribution networks, provides superb investment potential and the ability to get cheaper goods.
Higher Turnover of Items
It almost goes without saying that every profit seeking business needs to find a way to make profit. Two competing ways to do this are to either sell lots of items with a low margin or sell fewer items with a higher margin. Fast fashion goes for the former of these ideologies and builds their brand on a reputation for providing the customer with a deal. In these stores it is more likely that a shopper will buy multiple items especially with retail psychology being used to increase the number of items in a basket via tactics such as product arrangement and multi-buy options.
Little is wrong with this approach from a business point of view, however it does lead to high waste levels as the quality of the goods is often low and if people pay little for something they often don’t hold it in high regard. This has a bad effect on the environment as well as shaping the companies approach to their entire supply chain. For it can be that the item, its producers and materials used are all not adequately valued by the customer and retailer alike.
Cheaper Distribution Networks
The more business you do with a supplier the lower your costs will be. Again this is normal in business and encourages companies to do more business with any given supplier. However, in a world where margin is key this can lead to the supplier being squeezed to an unmanageable degree, encouraging them to carry our unethical practices in order to compete. It is really easy to argue that the supplier has the ability to counter this and that the responsibility to do so is theirs. Yet you can also argue that all companies have the responsibility to treat all their suppliers in an ethical way and not put them in this type of position. How a company responds to this dilemma is a great indicator of the ethics held by a company.
Superb Investment Potential
If profit is your king then investment potential is a major driver. If you sell a high numbers of items and daily increase your customer base then you will make investors happy as they can see progress and therefore ultimately the potential for greater gain for themselves. This is all well and good except that it means the company risks attracting investors who are likely to want a quick buck, therefore putting pressure to put profit ahead of ethical work conditions and can negatively impact a companies employees.
Ability to get Cheaper Goods
The more you buy, the more you spend, the more you spend the greater your buying power, the greater your buying power the less you pay per item. This cycle makes sense in general, is part of all businesses and allows companies to grow and suppliers to have stable income. However some fast fashion companies also use their buying power to put pressure on delivery dates with the result that a delivery date is scheduled at a breaking point for the supplier: possible but unlikely to be met. For every day (yes day) that the delivery is late, the purchase price is then reduced, sometimes per item. When you consider that many companies will make changes to the order whilst it is with the manufacturer and that the prices and delivery dates will be set to just within local and often slack guidelines, you start to see that the manufacturer is under immense pressure to cut every conceivable cost in order to meet costs.
You will often see large companies make arrangements with their manufacturers that become increasingly harsh over time. “You hit 3 months last time, this next deadline should be in 2 months this time.” This will continue until that company can’t meet their demands any more at which point a new manufacturer will be chosen and the cycle will start again.
I have spoken to people on social platforms who have argued that the people need work and that they have a choice whether or not to accept the terms of the contracts they are offered. I argue that this is arrogant and negates responsibility.
At the end of the day fast fashion is not sustainable, the people who produce it become poorer with staggeringly high suicide rates whilst waste is increasingly killing the planet. As you may know the fashion industry is actually second only to the oil industry in its negative effect on the planet. I could talk about this for a long time and might well do so in a future blog but for now I will just ask: Is a cheap t-shirt really worth that?
How Else Can This Work?
Although it might seem like we are stuck with the fast fashion model there are viable alternatives. We can use vintage material like Kinchi, we can visit the facturies and ensure good working conditions like Anne Wiggins and we can simply buy better not more. Part of what led me to decide to stock the vegan jacket brand James & Co was the fact they they know exactly what happens in their factories and consider it their responsibility to do so. They have a clear code of conduct in their relationship with the factories as part of their marketing strategy as shown in the video below.
I am tempted to say there are now an increasing number of companies which run in an ethical way but that would suggest that ethics in fashion is a new concept which is simply not the case. Companies have treated each other with respect for a long long time and there are countless examples throughout the world of synergy between companies providing healthy sales environments and the provision of fashion to the consumer.
Now, it is worth saying Ethically Clothed is not a Not for Profit company and I’m not suggesting all companies should be. I just passionately think that a company has responsibility in the world to more than just its share holders. As such I will leave you with a quote from Anne Lappe:
