Fast Fashion, the hidden poison to the environment
Article by Fofae.co
Hi, I am Hasan Minhaj and I wanna talk about something very important to me: fashion. Yeah, look…even if you don’t care about fashion, it’s important, it’s a form of expression, right? What you wear says something about you, right? Yeah, you wear that shirt, it says you like that brand. You wear those combat boots, it says you’re edgy. But fashion is a huge part of our culture, and we are about to enter the holiday shopping season, where Americans are expected to spend $1.1 trillion. We are a society that likes to shop. I have a problem! with Eight fucking bags of Supreme. I got these. Oh, ho, ho! Did I need this? No. I just think this is amazing. Research shows some folks actually geta physical high from shopping. According to an analysis provided by the facial tracking company nViso, she is on a shopping high. Her eyes are wide and alert, mouth slightly open. These are all signs that the pleasure centre in her brain is lighting up. She’s not shopping. She just dropped molly with RoboCop. Now, in the 1980s, the average American bought about twelve new articles of clothing every year. Makes sense, right? You guys remember back to school shopping? Right, your mom takes you to Old Navy. You get two pairs of jeans, a performance fleece, and a jacket. That was it. You’re like, “7th grade, here I come. ”Now, the average American buys 68 new pieces a year, and that is large because of this dominant force in the clothing industry. Fast fashion is a series of chain retailers who basically are able to look at the runways and make garments really quickly and put them into a “see now buy now” kind of retail environment. Fast fashion is also about when we say fast, it’s not gonna last in your wardrobe very long. Fast fashion is about making trendy clothes quick, cheap, and disposable. It’s like toilet paper that almost makes you look like Ariana Grande. Like, almost. Now, there are a lot of fast fashion retailers, but you know the big ones. Fashion Nova, Topshop, H&M, and of course, Zara. Yeah, fast fashion is popular because it’s democratized high fashion, and they do that by knocking off designer brands at scale. You guys remember this article, right? I like million-dollar deals Where’s my pen? Bitch. I like those Balenciaga as The ones that look like socks. So when she says, “Those Balenciaga as, the ones that look like socks, ”she’s talking about these shoes, which cost about 800 bucks. So pretty soon, Zara started selling these for 60 bucks. For $60, you could basically be a discount version of Cardi B. You know, an Azealia Banks. Now, this entire business model has changed the world, and that is why I want to talk about fast fashion.
Fast fashion is the fashion now. Just look at this surrounding, every dude is officially brought to you by Zara. That is why we all look like we manage a BMW dealership in Fremont. Like I feel like you’re gonna come and be like, “What do I have to say for you to walk out of here with a 3 Series?” And I get why we love it. We want the feeling of luxury without paying full price. We want to look expensive-ish. Right? We’ve all been to H&M and been like, “Dress shirt for eight bucks? Cool. ”I just got to look decent at this wedding, but just like Cinderella, everything dissolves by midnight.
The average An American woman is buying 64 new articles of clothing per year, half of which are worn three times or less. The only mass-market retailer that can cater to this extreme need we have for variety right now at an average price point that anyone could afford is currently H&M and Zara. And that’s why fast fashion has been the only segment of the fashion industry that’s grown over the last fifteen years. That’s an understatement. Fast fashion companies are killing legacy brands. Just look at Gap, Levi’s, and the parent company of Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein. Now, look at H&M and Zara. That is total domination. It’s like when white people got into the yoga game. They blew us out of the water. You guys kicked our fucking ass. Like, we were humming along for thousands of years, and then Core Power hit Venice Beach and it’s like… mmm! It’s all over.
Zara’s parent company Inditex is the biggest retail clothing company in the world, which has made Zara’s founder, Amancio Ortega, incredibly wealthy. He is the seventh richest person in the world, worth almost $70 billion. Now, you might be wondering, “What does Ortega do with all that money? Does he buy a private Island? Does he start a space company? Does he run a pointless presidential campaign? ”Nope. Who is Ortega? He really is not a very well-known name, like Warren Buffett. Amancio Ortega is a guy who just likes to be left alone. One of his quotes out there, and there are very few of them is that “I just want to live a normal life and be able to sip coffee with my wife in the piazza with nobody paying attention to me. ”That is so European. He’s like, “I want to sip coffee in the piazza, smoke cigarettes, and sleep with the sister of my wife. Just a normal life. ”Ortega started his retail empire back in 1975 when he opened his first clothing store, which he called Zorba. This is true, Zara was originally called Zorba. But there was also a bar in town called Zorba, and the owner complained, so Ortega just rearranged the letters to say, Zara. Yeah, even back then Zara was knocking off other brands. But still, there is a reason why Zara became the world’s biggest clothing retailer. They pioneered and perfected the fast fashion business model. Now generally, legacy brands release huge amounts of clothes in a few seasonal releases. They spend months designing lines, buying and treating fabrics, manufacturing in bulk, and distributing. It’s a process that can take nearly two years. Watergate took the same amount of time it took Gucci to come up with this Trudeau turtleneck. All right. I’ll tell you what, Nixon would have been impeached way faster if he had just worn that sweater. I’m just saying. Now, anyway…In the 80s, Zara completely changed the fashion game by combining two techniques.
1 Pillar: Quick response manufacturing
The first is quick response manufacturing, which basically says, “Forget big expensive releases, let’s knock off a design quick, keep raw materials on hand, only make more if it’s popular, and streamline distribution.” So when new trends break, these companies catch the wave with lightning speed. Kim Kardashian recently took to social media to slam fast fashion brands, two days after she wore an eye-catching Thierry Mugler design, which had been ripped off by Fashion Nova. Within 24 hours of Kim being seen in the outfit, Fashion Nova launched a very similar dress, just for $50. Look at that. Within one day, everyone looked like they accidentally put on their dress backwards. All because of Kim K.I would wear that dress.
I’m just very sensitive about the way my lungs look. Look, this is happening all the time. These Brother Vellies shoes retail $715. Zara’s knockoff? 60 bucks. This Knots & Vibes dress, retail $130. Fashion Nova, 40 bucks. Now, you’re probably wondering, “How is any of this legal?” Knockoffs mostly are not counterfeits. People tend to conflate them, but they’re not the same.“ This is a counterfeit. It copies the symbols of the brand that made the original.” So, counterfeits are typically illegal.“ Knockoffs, on the other hand, just resemble the design of the original and that’s usually fine.” Knockoffs are basically legal. That’s why you can go to Times Square and get a purse made by Yves Saint Larry. I got my wife one. I was like, “Baby, look. It’s Saint Larry, it’s French.” And she’s like, “Hasan, it says ‘Larry’. ” And I’m like, “Babe, why would Mexican Elmo lie to me?” Now, making knockoffs super fast means companies depend on real-time data to regulate supply and demand, monitor trends, and scour social media for feedback.
2 Pillar: Dynamic assortment
The second pillar of their business model, dynamic assortment: which is just a fancy way of saying, “Sell new shit every day.” If quick response helps catch waves fast, dynamic assortment constantly pumps out new products to see what sells. “H&M salespeople tell us new clothes come in every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday.” Instead of two seasons a year, we practically have 52 seasons a year. So, we have something new coming in every week. And fast fashion has created this.“52 seasons a year.” You know we call them weeks, right? No one needs that much new stuff every week. No other business works like this. I stand corrected. I was wrong. Now, this business model has revolutionized the industry. But it also means we are now drowning in clothes. Last year, Inditex alone made1.6 a billion pieces of clothing, and they run nearly 7,500 stores. Since 2005, they have been opening at a rate of more than once a day. These guys are the new Dunkin’ Donuts, except with working credit card readers. Next thing you know, you’re gonna walk in for a coffee and then just walk out with three neon puffer jackets. You’re like, “Iqbal, I can’t pay cash. My total is $148.” And he’s like,“ Just Venmo me at Iqbal786.”
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