The Importance of Sustainable Clothing Manufacturing

Taking a look into our own closets, we can observe the accumulation of the latest fashion trends and latest designs. But what happens to these clothes after they are out of style or worn out? Each year, 85% or 3.8 billion pounds of clothes bought by Americans are discarded in nearby landfills (Bick, 2018). That’s almost 70 pounds per person each year (Bick, 2018).

This is the result of a popular movement in the fashion industry known as fast fashion. Fast fashion is the mass production of clothing straight from the runway to local clothing stores (Bick, 2018). This process allows for fashionable clothing to be available to all consumers without being too expensive. In the past 15 years, global clothing production has doubled to meet current consumer demands, which have increased by 60% in number of clothes bought each year (Butler, 2018). This process enforces the ideal that clothing is disposable after a few uses. Out of all the disposed clothing, less than 1% of the material is recycled by the market and the rest ends up polluting local rivers and oceans. In order to make these clothes so cheap, many unsafe and unsustainable systems are utilized. Fast fashion may seem like a blooming business model, but at what cost?

In order to make clothing affordable to all consumers, the manufacturing of these products is outsourced to lower-middle income countries such as China and Bangladesh. These countries have fewer regulations and laws regarding labor conditions and compensation.Typically, each American buys four pieces of clothing from China through fast fashion every year. While the typical minimum wage in the US is $7.25 per hour, Chinese workers make about 12-18 cents per hour for their labor (Claudio, 2007).

The materials and fabrics used in fast fashion are not very environmentally -friendly. Most clothing sold in the United States (~90%) is made of cotton or polyester (Bick, 2018). Tons of water and pesticides are required to grow cotton. Polyester is synthesized from petroleum oil, volatile organic compounds, particulate matter, and acid gases, which emit several toxins into the air (Claudio, 2007).

The processes to dye leather and create ripped jeans are also very unsustainable. The tanning process of leather produces lots of toxin and metal waste which ends up in local bodies of water, harming nearby marine ecosystems. To create ripped and worn-down jeans, the process of sandblasting is used in many factories. The sand or silica dust causes respiratory problems in most workers since they are working in poor conditions and not using proper respiratory protective equipment. Their dust exposure levels were “20 times the recommended levels with respirable dust” and most workers developed a condition called silicosis from about 3 years of working in these factories (Hobson, 2013).

Social injustice and environmental damage are all the hidden costs to creating the cheap clothing constantly buy. These clothes go have a quick life cycle before being considered out of fashion. While some of these clothes are recycled or sold to lower-middle income countries, most end up in the trash. This is why throwaway garments contribute more to climate change than air and sea travel (Butler, 2018).

Park and Kim’s 2016 study examines the triple bottom line theory from lecture and whether it fits with the context of fast fashion and the fashion industry in general. It focuses on each pillar in varying degrees individually then as a whole to see the different impacts on the brand and customer relationship. In summary, the results showed that commitment to environmental sustainability did not impact the relationship. The results for social sustainability were not consistent. While some companies were positively benefited by strong social sustainability standards, the relationships with fast fashion companies was not influenced. Lastly, economic sustainability had the most significance of all three. Selling quality products has the greatest impact on strengthening the customer and brand relationship. Clothing companies today could improve their perceived image by selling higher quality products that would get more uses even without improving their social and environmental sustainability. While all three are ideal, the more an article of clothing is used the lower its carbon footprint.

• Data trends have found that countries with large fabric and apparel industries rely mostly on fossil fuels as a source for energy production in factories and beyond.
• This could lead to exponential growth in greenhouse gas and greenhouse emissions.
• Figures on increasing environmental impact if 80% of emerging markets reach western per capita consumption levels serve as warnings for future fast fashion environmental impact. (Remy et al., 2016)

"At Patagonia, we appreciate that all life on earth is under threat of extinction. We aim to use the resources we have—our business, our investments, our voice and our imaginations—to do something about it." -- Patagonia

H&M has grown to be the second-largest clothing company in the world, producing about three billion items for sale across 4,800 stores (Vogue 2018). Due to a production process that lead to $4.3 billion worth of unsold clothes in early 2018, H&M was forced to rectify its fast fashion structural issues. Since then, H&M has launched collections to include sustainably sourced materials such as organic cotton and recycled polyester, launched a garment-collecting initiative, and introduced combined deliveries, electric vans, and packaging-free delivery. Because of these efforts, H&M earned their spot as one of the highest scoring retail companies on the Fashion Revolution 2018 Transparency Index, shown below. This index aims to compare the transparency in manufacturing, sourcing, and retail practices of many prominent clothing companies.

References

Bick, R., Halsey, E., & Ekenga, C. C. (2018). The global environmental injustice of fast fashion. Environmental Health, 17(1). doi:10.1186/s12940-018-0433-

Butler, S. (2018, December 29). Is fast fashion giving way to the sustainable wardrobe? Retrieved from  https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/dec/29/fast-fashion-giving-way-sustainable-wardrobe 

Claudio L. (2007). Waste couture: environmental impact of the clothing industry. Environmental health perspectives, 115(9), A448–A454.

Park, H., & Kim, Y. (2016). An empirical test of the triple bottom line of customer-centric sustainability: The case of fast fashion. Fashion and Textiles, 3(1). doi:10.1186/s40691-016-0077-6

B Corporation. (n.d.). Certification. Retrieved from  https://bcorporation.net/certification 

Biondi, A. (2019, February 21). Can fast fashion be green? Retrieved from  https://www.voguebusiness.com/technology/HM-fast-fashion-sustainability-recycling-hong-kong 

John Hobson, To die for? The health and safety of fast fashion, Occupational Medicine, Volume 63, Issue 5, July 2013, Pages 317–319,  https://doi.org/10.1093/occmed/kqt079 

Style that's sustainable: A new fast-fashion formula. (n.d.). Retrieved from  https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/sustainability/our-insights/style-thats-sustainable-a-new-fast-fashion-formula 

Shen, B. (2014, September 11). Sustainable Fashion Supply Chain: Lessons from H&M. Retrieved from  https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/6/9/6236/htm 

Sustainable supply chain management in the fast fashion industry: An analysis of corporate reports. (2014, April 13). Retrieved from  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026323731400022X