Fast Fashion and College Students
Madison, WI — Social media has touched nearly every aspect of our everyday lives. It has been incredibly impactful on a number of industries, with one of the most evident examples being the fashion industry and the rapid rise of “fast fashion.”
Social media has made it so that the trend cycle rotates seemingly daily. For the first time, products are circling worldwide at a rate that would have been completely impossible before the twenty-first century. We now live in a world where it is deemed unacceptable by the masses to post twice in the same outfit. Our email inboxes are flooded with messages from clothing brands, each of them claiming to have the clothes most in touch with the recent trends.
“Fast fashion” is generally used in reference to brands that consistently release new clothing items and lines for incredibly low prices. Some of the “top” fast fashion brands (i.e. the ones with the greatest number of products for the lowest prices) include Shein, Temu, and TikTok Shop. Each of these has (rightfully so) had their own ethical concerns, particularly in relation to the labor policies used to ensure that these companies can continue to pump clothes out at such a low price to consumers. Many have been accused of using child labor, and reports have been done on the abysmal working conditions for many of the workers.
Since beginning college, the fast fashion cycle has become even more apparent to me. Wearing the same shirt for multiple nights out is an anomaly for many students. Rather, it has become normal to order new tops and outfits monthly or even bi-weekly. Further exacerbating this issue is the fact that trends seem to change overnight. Because social media algorithms seem to arbitrarily decide what is worth promoting each day, a different style of clothing seems to be trending nearly every week, leading to the purchase of impermanently “trending” outfits. Clothing sites like Shein have perfected their business model, catering to impressionable young audiences using social media and influencers.
There are hundreds of websites out there with clothing items available for incredibly low prices. These sites sell tops, skirts, and jackets for anywhere from as little as three dollars, and attract so many college students for precisely this reason. Typically, most students are working on a budget and can’t afford to spend exorbitant amounts of money on new clothes. In this sense, these sites solve a problem for them. However, it is vital to consider just how many of these clothing items eventually end up in the trash.
It is also important to think about the marketing strategies of these brands. Fast fashion brands mark their prices up, and then put them on sale for anywhere from 20% to 80% off, a tactic that urges its audiences to buy due to the seemingly “great deal” that the discount offers. TikTok Shop pushes certain products on its consumers, it is not uncommon to scroll on your “For You” page on TikTok and have every other video be an ad for a clothing product.
While it is difficult to avoid the fast fashion cycle, it is not impossible. Simply being more conscious and taking the time to consider whether an article of clothing is really worth buying can make all the difference in the world. With each consumer that works to shift the cycle, we can move towards a more sustainable, ethical future.
