Everledger CEO Leanne Kemp reflects on the rapid deceleration of fast fashion during the COVID-19 pandemic. As industry voices call for a more sustainable approach, what are the future opportunities and challenges from this enforced slowdown?
In recent years, a chorus of different environmentalists, human rights organizations and business leaders have campaigned against the negative impact of fast fashion. Water pollution, mono-farming, microplastics and textile waste are damaging the planet. Worker rights in developing countries are flouted to meet the insatiable demand for variety in the West. Consumerism has swollen global counterfeiting of high-end goods to nearly $100bn, with luxury brands incurring losses of more than $30bn. Complex supply chains shroud bad practices and present unacceptable business risk.
The argument was easily made, but change has proved harder to achieve. During the last quarter, however, the global spread of Covid-19 has docked container ships, padlocked factories and shuttered shops. Change has come at a traumatic pace. It’s not just fast fashion that has felt the impact. The whole manufacturing industry – which amounts to 16% of global GDP – has taken a blow to the solar plexus.
As just one example, the high-street chain Primark is well known in the UK and US for its cut-price clothing and resistance to online retail. In March this year, monthly sales dropped from £650 million to zero. Staff have been furloughed to ride out the trauma. Yet, even when the lockdown is lifted, how quickly will consumers return to their buy-and-bin habits of the past? Beyond the immediate cash constraints, several months stuck indoors will surely bring home just how much excess stuff and clutter we have in our lives. Could the long-term business model of disposable fashion be under threat, if enough customers choose to buy better quality clothes that are made to last by local manufacturers?
Several prominent voices have recently shared their hope that the crisis will provide a wake-up call for the industry, in all its many forms.
A new era of transparency?
Moving forward, greater traceability may help to mitigate the risks of opaque and inefficient supply chains. Brands are increasingly looking to technology to reassure consumers about the provenance of their products.
Companies big and small in the luxury goods sector are starting to harness the commercial benefits of transparency. Through the interaction of blockchain, NFC and IoT technologies, they can create a unique digital identity for every garment, helping to give luxury brands the confidence to stand behind the goods that bear their name.
By surfacing the lifetime journey of luxury goods, counterfeiting can be combated, while supporting fair working conditions and ethical sourcing of raw materials. Each product can have its ownership registered on a blockchain platform, where every transaction is securely recorded and made accessible to end consumers via their smartphones.
This solution is poised to drive high engagement and develop re-commerce even further. Equipped with transparent and trustworthy information, customers can buy, collect and sell items on with 100% certainty that every piece is one-of-a-kind, sourced from sustainable fabrics and made by people who take real pride in working for the brand.
The power of trust
If the industry does rethink its values, then trust should be at the top of the list. This goes much further than separating a designer handbag from a back-street fake. Customers want to know without doubt that their item conforms to the highest ethical values. For example, can the brand prove that all its workers are properly compensated? Can all the raw materials – especially animal skins and precious metals, diamonds and gemstones – be traced to non-conflict, sustainable sources? Saying so doesn’t make it so. The burden of evidence is with the manufacturers.
The environmental footprint of brands has quickly become a source of competitive advantage. Tracking raw materials usage, waste and water management, and proper use of chemicals are part of the brand story. Fast fashion cycles and growing branding expenditures mean fashion houses are increasingly finding more sustainable ways to differentiate their brands. When products from a fashion label are counterfeited, reputations built on craft, origin, and quality are inevitably tarnished.
In his open letter to the WWD, the veteran designer Giorgio Armani wrote: “The decline of the fashion system as we know it began when the luxury segment adopted the operating methods of fast fashion, mimicking the latter’s endless delivery cycle in the hope of selling more, yet forgetting that luxury takes time, to be achieved and to be appreciated. Luxury cannot and must not be fast. This crisis is an opportunity to slow down and realign, (…) an opportunity to restore value to authenticity.”
Blockchain’s security and anonymity can help to power authenticity. The luxury empires and the smallest of Maisons stand to benefit from increased trust, gained through a clearer picture of the life history of every product. In a contentious world, this provenance can help to form consensus and mutual trust, and even drive re-commerce.
Spread the word. Transparency is now in fashion.
