Fast fashion | Fast fashion's environmental impact

 

Fast fashion

Fast fashion is a term used to describe a highly profitable business model based on catwalk trends and high fashion design replicas and mass production at low cost. The term fast fashion is quickly used to generously describe the products of fashion business models.

Fast fashion history

Before the 1800s, fashion was a broad and almost primitive process where one had to source materials like wool or leather, make them, and weave them into garments. However, the Industrial Revolution introduced new technologies - such as sewing machines, textile machines, and ready-made garment factories, and expanded the world of fashion by introducing mass production of garments. All of this makes clothing cheaper, easier, and faster. Meanwhile, the local garment-making business began to work for middle-class people and they hired hard-working employees to work with garment workers, who worked from home for low wages. Such operations later led to the growth of ‘sweatshops’ which would provide the basis for the production of modern clothing. During World War II, the trend toward more functional styles and fabric restrictions led to the standardized production of clothing. Once middle-class consumers become accustomed to it, they become more receptive to the idea of ​​mass-produced clothing.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, fast fashion became an emerging industry in The United States and people enthusiastically participated in consumerism. Fast fashion retailers like Zara, H&M, Top Shop, and Primark have embraced high-street fashion. Starting as small stores located primarily in Europe, they were able to penetrate the American market and gain a reputation by testing and redesigning the look and design elements from runway shows and top fashion houses and quickly reproducing and selling at a fraction of the cost.

Fast fashion purpose

The main purpose of fast fashion is to produce a product with fast affordable prices to save the rapidly changing customer to respond in real-time as much as possible. This skill is achieved by understanding the target market and the demand of retailers, which is a high fashion look apparel at a price at the bottom end of the apparel sector. Many companies use this collaboration to further develop a more sophisticated and efficient supply chain model to maximize the overall profitability of the resource market. The fastest fashion market uses it in conjunction with foreign manufacturers to keep prices low.

Fast fashion concept

In the 1980s, the United States developed fast fashion from the concept of a product based on a productive model known as the fast response to the market-based model of fast fashion in the late 1990s and early twenty-first century has come. The Zara brand name has become almost synonymous with the term, but other retailers, such as Benetton, worked on the idea before applying the label. Fast fashion is associated with disposable fashion because it delivers designer products to a mass market at relatively low prices.

Fast Fashion's environmental impact

The environmental impacts of fast fashion include the reduction of non-renewable sources, greenhouse gas emissions, and the use of large amounts of water and energy. The fashion industry is the second largest consumer industry of water, requiring about 700 gallons and 2,000 gallons of water to produce one pair of jeans to produce one cotton shirt. Business Insider further warned that textile dyeing is the world's second-largest water contaminant, as water from the dyeing process is often discharged into canals, streams, or rivers.

In addition, brands use synthetic fibers such as polyester, nylon, and acrylic that take hundreds of years to biodegrade. A 2017 report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature estimated that all microplastic-non-biodegradable plastics at sea came from the laundering of polyester national synthetic textiles. According to the documentary, The True Cost, published in 2015, the world receives about 80 billion new pieces of clothing each year, 400% more than it used twenty years ago. The average American now produces 82 pounds of textile waste per year. Collecting livestock for leather production requires large amounts of feed, land, water, and fossil fuels, while the tanning process is the most toxic in all areas of the fashion supply chain because of the chemicals used to tan leather, including mineral salts, formaldehyde, coal-tar derivatives, and various Oils and dyes are not biodegradable and contaminate water sources.

The production of plastic fibers in textiles is an energy-intensive process that requires large amounts of petroleum and releases volatile particulate matter and acids such as hydrogen chloride. Additionally, cotton, which is in abundance in fashion products, is also not environmentally friendly to produce. Pesticides considered necessary for cotton growth present health risks to farmers.

Fast fashion market strategies

Marketing is a key factor in fast fashion. Marketing creates the desire to use new designs as much as possible at the point of creation. Marketing closes the gap between creation and consumption by promoting it as something fast, low-cost, and disposable. The relentless release of new products essentially turns garments into a highly affordable marketing tool that visits consumers, raises brand awareness, and results in higher rates of consumer purchases. Fast fashion companies have enjoyed higher profit margins with only 15% of their markdown percentage compared to 30% of competitors. The model of fast-fashion business is based on reducing the time cycle of customers from production so that customers are involved in more cycles at any given time. For example, fashion theatrical fashion seasons follow the annual cycles of summer, autumn, winter, and spring, but in fast fashion, the cycles are shorter in a short period of 4-6 weeks and in some cases shorter. Marketers have created more buying seasons at the same time.

Two strategies are currently being used by companies as market strategies; the difference is the amount of financial capital spent on advertising. When some companies invest in advertising, the fast-fashion mega-firm Primark operates without any advertising. Primark instead invests in in-store layout, shop fit, and visual merchandising to create instant hooks. Instant Hook creates an enjoyable shopping experience, resulting in an uninterrupted return of customers. Research shows that 75 percent of customer decisions are made in front of the stabilizer within three seconds. Primark's alternative costs also enable retailers to return cost-saving benefits to consumers and maintain the company's pricing structure to produce clothing at a lower cost.