2.1. Fast fashion and the supply chain

Fast fashion retailers reproduce designs from catwalk to stores in the short run to capture current trends in the market. Unlike conventional brands, they are extremely malleable. For example, fast fashion brands often dye their garments after they are constructed, thus allowing them to produce the bestselling colors quickly as compared to their conventional competitors. These retailers are often associated with disposable fashion because they are able to deliver designer products to a mass market at a relatively low price, though the garments often do not survive more than a limited number of wearings. One of the important characteristics of these fast fashion retailers is that they are known to adopt an agile supply chain (Christopher, Lowson, & Peck, 2004) to their business model that enhance their responsiveness to changing market trends.

While traditional fashion buyers utilized a fixed calendar of trade fairs, fashion shows, fabric and other events, organized around a two-season approach, the agile supply chain as adopted by fast fashion retailers allows for as many as 20 seasons per year. Fast fashion, accordingly, can respond very quickly to emerging trends and changing demands of fashion consumers. Agile supply chains, unlike conventional supply chains, are shorter and demand-driven. Further, agile supply chains are information-based, as opposed to inventory-based (Christopher, 2000). These key distinctions of an agile supply chain help fast fashion retailers to compete successfully in a fashion market which is considered very volatile and difficult to predict. Agile supply chain is also known to have the following characteristics (Harrison Christopher, & van Hoek, 1999):

• Market-sensitive – closely connected to end user trends
• Virtual – reliant upon shared information across all supply chain partners
• Network-based – gaining flexibility through utilization of the strengths of specialist players
• Process-aligned – possessing a high degree of process interconnectivity between the network members.

2.2. Fast fashion and the retail environment

The retail environment encompasses a number of physical elements – fascia, overall store design, window display, layout, fixtures and fittings, decorations and signage – that encompass both tangible and intangible attributes (McGoldrick, 2002; Varley & Raffiq, 2004). All these attributes contribute to the overall in-store communication of the product or the retailer in the process of enhancing consumer intentions to purchase. Fast fashion has given a huge importance to agile supply chains; however, their retail environment as noted by both researchers and industry experts is still considered unresponsive and inflexible. On average, new merchandise is delivered two to three times every week at fast fashion retail stores. Due to the high frequency of deliveries and the volume of merchandise, store managers find it challenging to get the new fast fashion merchandise onto the shop floor. Sales staff often have poor knowledge of the featured garments and are puzzled when consumers come asking for styles that they have seen on TV or in magazines.

Further, window displays fail to reflect the fast fashion concept. Most fast fashion retailers have a centralized structure, which means there is little flexibility for stores to react to the local changes in the consumer demand driven by fast fashion (Barnes & Lea-Greenwood, 2010). Window displays are considered a key mode of communicating the fashion message to target consumers and an initial point of contact; however, the constraints of a centralized structure hinder efficient communication of the fast fashion concept to the consumer. Window displays of prominent fast fashion brands fail to be as responsive to local consumer demands as their supply chains. Most stores simply do not have enough resources to update the window displays and hence are unable to cope with the unpredictable nature of fast fashion and tend to rely more on the planned core fashion stories when displaying their windows. Thus, window displays and store communications may fail to keep the same pace with which fast fashion is developed and delivered.

However, irrespective of the different challenges faced by fast fashion brands on the retail floor, they are quite successful in communicating a sense of urgency to their consumers through signage and displays (Barnes & Lea-Greenwood, 2010). Signage like “get it before it goes,” “featured in Grazia” or “as seen in Glamour” supports the fast fashion concept and aids the consumer in buying into the look by making it more accessible. Moreover, fast fashion stores are known to create a sense of scarcity through their displays. There is a sense of tantalizing exclusivity, since only a few items are on display even though stores are spacious (for example, the average size of a Zara store is 1,000 m²). Thus, in a typical fast fashion store, customers can always find new products, but they are available only in limited quantity and for a limited time. A customer thinks, “this green shirt fits me but there is only one on the rack. If I don’t buy it now, someone else will, and I will lose my chance,” thus creating a notion of “buy it today else it will be gone tomorrow.” By strategically using signage and displays, fast fashion retailers are able to create a sense of urgency, immediacy and exclusivity – all representative of the fast fashion concept.

3.1. Production

Textile production requires high resource levels. For example, cotton, found in most clothing, is the most pesticide-dependent crop in the world, using approximately 25% of the world’s insecticides. The 5% of cotton-bearing land in India uses 55% of all pesticides in India. The average cotton T-shirt requires 1/3 pound of pesticide (Kennedy, 2016).

Problems associated with textile production have been noted for some time. For example, water usage by the textile mills industry in the US is estimated to have been about 135 billion gallons (O Ecotextiles, 2010). While this was only about 1% of industrial water usage at the time, most of it occurred in four states in the Southeast where the textile industry was concentrated. Given the decline in the US textile industry and improved efficiency in water use (for example, Australia, which has the most efficient cotton industry in the world, has doubled its water efficiency usage in the last 25 years), it can be expected that textile-related water usage in the US has decreased over the period of time. However, water usage by the textile industry has no doubt increased in the developing world. For example, textile factories in in the developing world use 1.5 billion m³ of fresh water each year (Pensupa et al., 2017).

Synthetic fibers are developed within factories and do not require water to grow the textile, but the production processes endanger workers and the environment through the use of hazardous chemicals (Lynch, 2009). All textiles create environmental issues during their production process, but the issues are exacerbated when synthetic fibers are involved. Almost all dyes, specialty chemicals and finishing chemicals are applied to textiles in water baths. The various fabric preparation processes (desizing, scouring, bleaching and mercerizing) use water, and most processes are followed by a thorough washing to remove the chemicals before the next step. Eventually the water used is returned to the ecosystem, usually without any attempt to remove the chemicals used the milling processes. Groundwater is polluted and the health of those who use water downstream is put at increased risk due to the dyestuff, solubalizers and dispersants, leveling agents, soaping and dyeing agents, finishing chemicals, cationic and nonionic softeners, and a few other assorted chemicals in the effluent (O Ecotextiles, 2010).

3.2. Maintenance

Clothes, once bought, need also to be maintained; for example, they require dry cleaning or tumble drying. Dry cleaning involves the use of the toxic chemical known as perchloroethylene or perc, which has been linked to reproductive problems, including miscarriage and male infertility, as well as disorders of the central nervous system (MacEachern, 2008, p. 241). Tumble drying of clothing accounts for 60% of the use phase energy. It is estimated (Fletcher, 2008, p. 81) that eliminating tumble drying and ironing, in combination with a lower washing temperature, would lead to about a 50% energy reduction related to the product.

3.3. Disposal

The US is a throwaway society, and much of what is disposed of is clothing. The planned obsolescence nature of fast fashion further encourages this throwaway culture. Hawley (2006) reported that Americans discard an estimated 68 pounds of clothing a year, with about one-seventh of that being recycled or reused. Most textiles ending up in landfills could have been recycled. Recycling means that the clothing will receive increased use, and will not do damage while underground. However, fast fashion mostly uses synthetic materials that do not decompose. Also, clothes made from natural materials like wool decompose but produce methane, thus contributing to global warming.

Many consumers also give their clothing to charity stores like Goodwill, Salvation Army, and Oxfam. These stores are able to sort the donations and sell about half of the items they receive at their recycling sites, with the remainder sold to textile dealers and brokers (rag dealers) after baling it. The global recycling industry consists of approximately 3,000 businesses that are able to divert over 1.25 million tons of post-consumer textile waste annually (Kennedy, 2016). Sorted garments are compressed into bales of 50 kg, whereas unsorted secondhand clothes can be compressed into bales of 500 to 1,000 kg. The better graded used clothing is exported to Central America and the lower graded clothing is shipped to Africa and Asia. On the other hand, most of the recycled clothing from Europe goes to Russia or Eastern Europe. The world’s largest importers of used clothing are sub-Saharan countries, receiving over 25% of global secondhand exports. And the volume consists disproportionately of used women’s clothing (at least seven times of that of men’s). Thus, in street markets in Tanzania, men’s clothing costs four to five times as much as women’s. A possible byproduct of these imported cheap clothes is the harm being done to emerging textile industries in developing countries from the cheap competition.

Recognizing the importance of reducing the volume of textile waste sent to landfills, many brands including fast fashion brands have created different programs to raise awareness of textile recycling (Schaefer & Crane, 2005). For example, Marks & Spencer created a partnership with Oxfam, where for every bag of unwanted Marks & Spencer clothing donated to charity, the consumer receives a £5 voucher redeemable against purchases at Marks & Spencer over £35 (Marks & Spencer, 2008). Fast fashion brands are also creating public awareness about textile/clothing recovery. For example, H&M has started a famous awareness campaign “garment collecting program,” where they ask consumers to bring their old clothing to the local H&M stores which can be further used for various purposes. Some of the purposes include reselling, cleaning rags for the oil or manufacturing companies, selling to “flocking” firms, where items are shredded for fillers in car insulation, roofing felts, and furniture padding or converting materials like linen, cotton, and viscose into paper pulps. Besides constructive actions taken by brands, these issues have become an important focus for governments worldwide. For example, in the UK the government has implemented effective regional waste strategies. Traditionally, the UK relied on landfills for waste disposal, which created various environmental concerns. As a result, a Landfill Tax was legislated (Keynote, 2007). The government has also started various programs to educate consumers how to minimize their household waste (Waste Aware Scotland, 2007).

These practices have been successful in not only creating mass awareness but also in facilitating efficient waste management. Consumers are becoming well aware of the various unethical issues associated with fast fashion brands (Ertekin & Atik, 2015). They have started demanding more information about sourcing and manufacturing, thus making fast fashion companies conscious of their unethical behaviours. Due to these awareness campaigns, some consumers are focusing more on quality and wearing styles rather than purchasing low-quality current fashions every week. “Slow fashion” instead of fast fashion is becoming the new concept, where consumers focus on buying high-quality styles that can be worn over various seasons. Given the ubiquitous desire for an attractive appearance, the aesthetics and cheap prices offered by the fast fashion industry may keep the industry viable despite its associated serious environmental and social concerns. This chapter intends to provide an understanding of the fast fashion industry by examining both the micro and the macro perspectives. At a micro level, fast fashion by introducing new merchandise almost weekly give consumers freedom to express themselves. However, when examining fast fashion at the macro level, both industry and consumers need to understand that if fashion consumption keeps increasing, the impacts on the social and ecological environments will pose a threat to the quality of life of future generations. Thus, for fast fashion to succeed in the long term, there is a necessity to develop and market sustainable alternatives.