The Excerpt podcast: The ethics of fast fashion should give all of us pause

On a special episode (first released on January 18, 2024) of The Excerpt podcast: The term “fast fashion” brings to mind factories spitting out enormous volumes of clothing using cheap fabric and sweatshop labor. All so that we, the consumers, can sport the latest new looks at low prices. But the industry has become a boiling cauldron of questionable ethics. From mafia style business practices to sweatshop labor, not to even mention the environmental costs. All of which begs the question: should fast fashion even exist? Elizabeth Segran, a senior staff writer at Fast Company, joins The Excerpt to dig into these issues.

Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

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Dana Taylor:

Hello and welcome to The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Thursday, January 18th, 2024, and this is a special episode of The Excerpt.

The term fast fashion brings to mind factories spitting out enormous volumes of clothing using cheap fabric and sweatshop labor. Also, that we, the consumers can support the latest new looks at low prices, but the industry has become a boiling cauldron of questionable ethics. First are the wars brewing between some of fast fashion's biggest purveyors, Temu and Shein. Designers aren't happy either with several recently filing a lawsuit against Shein for stealing their designs. Meanwhile, consumers are growing increasingly concerned about the environmental costs, all of which begs the question, should fast fashion even exist.

I'm joined now by Elizabeth Segran, a senior staff writer at Fast Company, to dig into these issues. Thanks for being on The Excerpt, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Segran:

Thank you so much for having me.

Dana Taylor:

So let's start by setting the stage here. How long has fast fashion been around and how fast is fast? What's the process and who spits it out the fastest?

Elizabeth Segran:

Okay. Well, if we want to go to the beginning of fast fashion, it started in the 1980s with pioneering brands like H&M and Zara. And at the time, they had this radical concept, which was that they were going to take the latest fashions that came off the runways and make them at very low prices in factories that were overseas and used cheap labor and spit them out really quickly, which at the time meant about six months after they hit the runway and make these products available to everyday consumers.

And this was a really awesome idea at the time because it seemed like it would democratize fashion, right? It would take it out of the hands of those who could afford designer labels and allow everybody to dress in the latest styles. But the problem is that it almost worked too well, and the entire industry realized that making inexpensive, very fashion-forward looks was the way that they were going to make a lot of money. And so, over the next couple of decades, a lot of brands decided that they were going to copy this fast fashion model, and this accelerated and accelerated until the point that we are at right now where there are these ultra fast fashion brands coming out of China that are doing things at a higher speed and a higher volume than anything we've ever seen before.

Dana Taylor:

Okay, let's dig into the lawsuits. Can you talk about the back and forth lawsuits between fast fashion rivals, Temu and Shein, and what they're accusing each other of?

Elizabeth Segran:

These Chinese companies use a network of factories in China that are able to turn clothing around at an extremely fast pace. And what's going on is that Shein basically has a lock on a lot of these factories and has contracts with a lot of these factories in order for it to continue turning out clothes at the remarkable speed that it's working at. And Temu, its biggest competitor, is saying that Shein is using mafia-like tactics to basically ensure that no other companies can come in and use those same factories.

Dana Taylor:

Well, designers are saying that fast fashion has essentially been stealing their designs, the lawsuit list copyright infringement alongside racketeering. What's the story here?

Elizabeth Segran:

Shein produces 10,000 new styles every single day. I mean, that is remarkable. So if you go onto the Shein website on any given day, there are going to be thousands and thousands of new styles. And the way that they do that is that they use algorithms to search on social media for what the latest looks are. And a lot of the time they will find looks that are made by independent designers and quickly make copies of them. And so there have been many lawsuits filed by independent designers who are trying to make a living with their designs. And Shein is just nakedly stealing and copying those designs almost exactly. And so there are several lawsuits that are going on now asking Shein to stop this behavior. And at the same time, Shein is doing this charm offensive, and what it's doing is it's trying to partner with lots of independent designers to say, "Hey, why don't you come and partner with us and we'll pay you to work for us." So it's doing this in a way to push back against this enormous wave of lawsuits that's coming their way.

Dana Taylor:

Well, and it's not just Shein and Temu whose practices are under the microscope. Fast fashion retailers, you mentioned H&M and Zara, they've previously been accused of greenwashing. What is greenwashing and is this still going on?

Elizabeth Segran:

Greenwashing is basically communicating to the public and marketing that you are using sustainable practices. The real problem is the sheer volume of products that they're pumping out into the market and selling at such low prices that it is hard to understand how those products can be made sustainably and respecting human labor. And so I think ultimately we see these little efforts to try and talk about their sustainability practices as actually obscuring the larger problem here, which is overproduction, which is leading to overconsumption, which is the real problem.

Dana Taylor:

Elizabeth, I want to circle back to the labor practices and dig in on that a little bit more of these fast fashion companies. What do we know about their labor practices and what don't we know?

Elizabeth Segran:

We know quite a lot. And actually, we know a lot because labor activists have been studying the fashion industry for decades. And we know that in order to make clothes that are this cheap, we're talking T-shirts that cost $3 and dresses that cost $10, something's got to give, and usually that means workers' rights. So in a lot of these factories that Shein and Temu uses in China, there have been reports of workers talking about very poor working conditions, not being able to go to the bathroom when they need to go to the bathroom, having to work eight to 10 hours straight. It's really hard to work 10 hours at a sewing machine without making a mistake that could potentially cost you a finger, for instance. Many of these workers are not paid a living wage. Another really disturbing thing is that cotton that Shein uses has been tied to the Xinjiang region of China where we know that there is a lot of forced labor happening. Fast fashion is not cheap. A lot of humans suffer in order for the prices to be this low.

Dana Taylor:

Well, sustainability and waste are also two issues that have daubed the fashion industry since the beginning. What are you hearing from consumers about how they think about fast fashion in this context?

Elizabeth Segran:

There's been a movement called the Slow Fashion Movement. And so, increasingly, there are consumers who are really alarmed about the impact that the fast fashion industry is having on the planet. We know that it produces between four to 8% of all climate emissions, so it's accelerating climate change. We know that it pollutes the waters. We know that it has an impact on human welfare. And so consumers are trying to rise up and use different consumer behaviors to signal to the market that we need change. So this means buying fewer items, wearing them for longer. There's a growing number of influencers on social media who are trying to not buy anything this year just to show that that can be done.

Dana Taylor:

Well, I did want to ask about these resale companies in particular. Obviously they want to slow down the output of new clothing items because of the impact on their business. How are they targeting fast fashion companies and are their efforts to influence consumers gaining any traction?

Elizabeth Segran:

Yes. An interesting development over the last couple of years has been that resale companies are directly taking aim at fast fashion in their marketing and in their advertising. So for instance, when Shein did a pop-up in San Francisco, which is where thredUP is based, thredUP asked all of their customers to boycott Shein. This was a really bold thing to do for one company to directly go after another company. But they thought that this was a really important opportunity for them to educate their customers about why fast fashion is so problematic. And also, it was a little self-serving because they were saying, instead of buying cheap fast fashion, why not get something secondhand?

Another thing that we've seen is the brand Vestier Collective, which sells slightly higher end secondhand products. They have put an all out ban on fast fashion brands on their platform. So they've said that you can't sell products on their platform from Shein, but they've also said that there are lots of other brands like Gap and Abercrombie that are producing so many clothes at such inexpensive prices that they also count as fast fashion. So they have gone after 30 different companies that they're saying are effectively fast fashion.

Dana Taylor:

Well, you recently wrote that the Biden administration to create a new cabinet position, a fashion czar. What would that person do and why do you think that it's needed?

Elizabeth Segran:

I think it's so interesting that governments around the world have ministers and cabinet positions that deal with industries that are very polluting, like the automotive industry and like the oil and gas industry and yet we don't think of fashion as equally damaging or as problematic. And the truth is that the fashion industry is a major polluter in the world, and it is actively accelerating our planet towards a climate catastrophe. We are beginning to see around the world legislation bubbling up that would curb the impact of the fast fashion industry. And my argument was that the Biden administration really ought to appoint a fashion czar the way that we have a climate czar and the way that we have somebody who's overseeing the automotive industry, somebody who can help push forward this legislative agenda and help make these laws that will curb the impact of the fashion industry and also protect workers.

Dana Taylor:

Finally, Elizabeth, and we've dug into a lot of the various issues surrounding fast fashion, pretty much everything we've touched on today, the lawsuits, the labor practices, the waste has to do with the industry's ethical practices. The EU has been trying to rein in fast fashion with a ban passed late last year on destroying unsold clothing. What do you think? Are consumers, American consumers ready for an all out ban on fast fashion?

Elizabeth Segran:

I really do think that consumers want this legislation, and that's because a lot of the consumers that are shopping from fast fashion brands are young consumers. And we know from polling and from data that young consumers are really worried about the state of the planet. But really, it's not the consumer's responsibility to curb their negative behavior. These companies need to be held to account by the government and by laws that curb the negative impact that they're causing on the planet. And I think that once these laws go into effect, consumers will be supportive of all of that because they want to live in a planet that is healthy and that is not hurtling towards disaster.

Dana Taylor:

Elizabeth, thank you so much for joining us on The Excerpt.

Elizabeth Segran:

Thank you so much, Dana. This was lovely.

Dana Taylor:

Thanks to our senior producer Shannon Rae Green for production assistance. Our executive producer is Laura Beatty. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to [email protected]. Thanks for listening. I'm Dana Taylor. Taylor Wilson will be back tomorrow morning with another episode of The Excerpt.