With a market value of USD 136 billion in 2024 and estimated to reach USD 184 billion by 2027, fast fashion is a major money-maker in the industry. But with that, comes consequences. Its business model rests on producing cheap, seasonal clothes at lightning speed, resulting in both overproduction and overconsumption. According to Greenpeace, around 100 billion garments are produced each year while 92 million tonnes end up in landfills. The fact of the matter is that the world has more clothes than is needed, leaving behind massive amounts of waste, and impacting global economies and environments.
The Evolution of Fast Fashion
While it is now considered a global phenomenon, the mass popularity of “fast” fashion did not become mainstream until the founding of Zara. The Spanish retailer by businessman Amancio Ortega first opened in 1975, offering cheaper alternatives to higher-end clothing. In the 1980s, Ortega reduced the store’s design-to-retail process to just five weeks — an unprecedented speed for the industry at the time.
Ortega’s business model revolutionised the state of fashion, with companies like H&M and Mango adopting the same manufacturing-to-retail process. During the pandemic, fast fashion experienced a boom, coupled with social media-driven microtrends, giving rise to e-commerce platforms like Shein and Temu — which have now pushed speed and affordability to new extremes.
Although fast fashion started as a way to optimise clothing production, it has now extended beyond retail, creating what a Vox article once called a “disposable society.”
An Unsustainable Supply Chain
Keeping the price of clothing cheap comes at the cost of the entire fast fashion supply chain. Labour and production are carried out without care for quality control or resource conservation. Just this year, Shein came under fire for labour exploitation — Guangzhou factory workers for Shein suppliers were found to be working 75-hour weeks, as reported by Swiss human rights group Public Eye. The investigation also found that many workers were being paid below the living wage (around RMB 6,500) in China.
On an environmental front, fast fashion is a large offender. The sheer amount of clothing produced requires mass amounts of materials, electricity, and water. An article from the science journal Nature found that the industry produces 92 million tonnes of waste and uses 79 trillion litres of water. Shein — which was declared fashion’s biggest polluter in 2023 by Yale University — emitted around 16.7 million tonnes of carbon emissions in that year alone.
Read More: Green is the New Black: Fashion’s Unsustainable Practices in Chasing Profits
The Role of Consumers
Not everything can solely be blamed on the industry’s production. The rise of influencer culture — combined with social media trends — has made it easier to be swept up in the excitement of new, trendy products. Merchandise that becomes viral is often bought and sold out in large waves, leading to high demand. But some trends go as quickly as they come, leading to a “buy now, wear once” culture. A Guardian article from this year stated that out of the 100 billion garments produced each year, 10 to 40 percent remain unsold.
However, this may be a sign of a change to come. In 2023, the “de-influencing” trend emerged on TikTok, with users dissuading others from simply buying products for the sake of it. Thrifting and upcycling old clothes are also popular topics on social media, particularly among Gen Z. While these efforts are admirable, they might be coming too late.
Beyond Fast Fashion
On the surface, fast fashion has glaring issues with wastage and overproduction. What is not as obvious is how consequential and invasive the industry has become. The abundance of fast fashion clothing not only ends up in landfills but also in thrift stores, slowly destroying the global clothing industry ecosystem.
While donating clothes might seem like a socially responsible act, it has now become an alternative way for consumers to get rid of their excess clothes. One only has to look at nonprofit organisations like Salvation Army, which cannot keep up with the overwhelming amount of clothes donated. In fact, due to the poor quality of fast fashion pieces, the majority of pieces are unable to be sold. Instead, only around 10 to 30 percent of donated clothing are resold, as reported by GQ. The rest are shipped off to the Global South.
Accra, Ghana contains one of the most polluted waterways on Earth — not due to local pollution, but because of secondhand clothing imports from Western countries. According to The Guardian, about 15 million pieces of clothing are imported weekly, many of which end up along the country’s shores. Stained denim and ripped t-shirts lie atop one another, the mountain of rubbish so large that Ghanaian houses must be built on top of the waste. The phenomenon has become so rampant, that locals have taken to calling it “broni wawu“, meaning “dead white man’s clothes.” According to statistics from Earth.Org, nearly 10 percent of microplastics dispersed in the ocean each year come from textiles
Ghana is not just physically affected but also economically. The country’s once thriving local textile production industry collapsed in the 1990s — at the same time it started accepting secondhand clothing imports from the United States, Europe, and China. AP News reported that a number of African countries are working to ban such imports but to little effect.
Read More: Beyond Glamour: Sustainability, Style, and Tech in 2024
Is There a Solution?
“Sustainability” as a concept is something that the fashion industry has been working towards for years, though it is easier said than done. The World Economic Forum found that 98 percent of CEOs see sustainability and profitability as a trade-off — one cannot exist at the same time as another.
Within the fashion industry, leading brands are turning towards technology as the answer. Last year, British designer Stella McCartney was awarded an Order of the British Empire for her brand’s commitment to sustainability. Since 2001, the brand has slowly phased out PVC materials and now uses 100 percent of renewable energy to power its Bond Street flagship in London. For fast fashion companies, a recent Forbes article suggested using AI to “calculate estimated product volumes” in order to avoid overproducing a garment.
However, societal behaviour remains the biggest challenge. Fast fashion historically thrives during times of economic hardship, simply because it is the cheapest option. Meanwhile, the relentless push of social media advertising keeps consumers buying. It is not just about re-wearing more or buying less — it is about reforming a system that prioritises profit over people and the planet.
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