Green with Overconsumption

The allure of finding one-of-a-kind items and vintage gems are shared in “thrift hauls” with over 1.7 million videos on TikTok with the hashtag “thrift.” Comments such as “What is the store called?” and “How is that real” are flooded on the post as fellow thrifters are envious of others’ unique finds and hope to be as lucky on their next hunt. Even though there is uncertainty behind the motivations of the fashion industry’s desire to go green, shoppers are wary of the fashion industry’s environmental impacts. More specifically, the “textile production is estimated to be responsible for about 20% of global clean water pollution [and] synthetic clothes accounts for 35% of primary microplastics released into the environment.” Despite the varying definitions to the term “sustainable fashion,” the consensus defines it as “garments that have been made in a way that is mindful of the many environmental issues that the fashion industry touches upon.” To be considerate of the environmental effects that the production of clothing creates, the main issues that must be considered are water consumption, energy emissions, chemical usage, and the inevitable generation of waste. Sustainable clothing should be derived from organic and biodegradable materials, minimize energy and water usage, and tackle excessive consumption. Considering all these factors, the secondhand clothing market can seem like an unequivocal solution. Thrifting — in theory — should solve the problem of the industry’s environmental impact, yet it fails to take both the fast fashion industry and consumers’ behaviors into account. While thrifting is often praised for reducing the environmental impact of shopping, there are many underlying concerns regarding sustainability as it encourages excess spending through perpetuating a culture of consumerism; moreover, purchasing second hand clothing has not proven to yield a long-term solution for the fashion industry’s harmful environmental effects.

Although thrifting may seem like a new concept given its recent surge in popularity, thrift stores have always given individuals an avenue to express themselves in an acquisitive manner. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, thrift stores, such as Salvation Army and Goodwill, became large-scale businesses. Fashion has always served the purpose of expressing personal identity, primarily exclusive to the upper class, until the emergence of the secondhand market. Through thrift stores, immigrants and the working class were able to participate in the consumer culture of fashion through the reduced cost that came with this form of self-expression. Additionally, flea markets served as another avenue where many artists and actresses transformed the acceptance of the secondhand market. The secondhand market challenged the capitalist values of communism through recycling clothing and the reduction of waste; nevertheless, thrift stores were able to profit from mass production, increasing in the 20th century. The origination of vintage clothing in the late 1950s, usually associated with the elegant style of the 1920s (such as raccoon fur clothes), sparked the entrance of the secondhand market into the upper class as these vintage clothes symbolized privilege and wealth. During the 1990s, shopping at thrift stores was “a rite of passage and a mode of personal identity,” and the style of thrifted clothing was so highly coveted that popular retail stores, such as Urban Outfitters, designed clothing that mimicked the designs of thrift stores. Throughout the decades, thrifting has denoted rebellion, androgyny, and nostalgia. Regardless of whether secondhand clothing fulfilled a necessity or endorsed personal desire, the prevalence and role of thrifting in pop culture has facilitated self-expression through the ability to experiment with different styles at a lower cost.

The increased popularity of thrifting amongst the younger generation raises a question in their motivations and true intentions behind secondhand retail. Although thrifting is not a new concept, its popularity skyrocketed amidst the younger population by normalizing and promoting thrifting to be “cool” evidenced by the 32% increase of secondhand shopping in 2021. Social media, especially TikTok, serves as a platform where thrifters share their love for creating modish outfits out of the unique pieces that they find at thrift stores. In a survey conducted by the New York Times, an overwhelming majority of Generation Z expressed their desire to thrift and the reasons that they are inclined to purchase secondhand clothing. However, their intentions and love for thrifting strayed from saving the planet. Affordability and the desire to have one-of-a-kind clothing were the main drivers in wanting to buy secondhand clothing, while sustainability seemed only to be a byproduct of its attraction. From limited drops to out-of-range price tags, the fashion industry capitalizes on its consumers through the promotion of exclusivity. Thrifting does not hold an exception to the industry’s standard as thrifters highlight their motive of “avoiding being basic” and the attraction of having something no one else will wear.The environmental benefits of thrifting are concealed behind the amazing feeling one gets when asked where they bought an article of clothing, and they get to say, “It’s thrifted.” Thrifting perpetuates overconsumption of clothing to fit the latest trend as consumers leave the store self-satisfied, with a bag full of virtue signaling for their job well done.

Although thrifting is supposed to combat the fast fashion industry, it is ineffective in its means of stopping the overproduction of clothing, and it gets engulfed by the fast fashion industry. The damage of overproducing fast fashion is not just apparent in retail stores but is becoming increasingly detectable in thrift stores today. As secondhand clothing stores reflect the popularity of current trends, it’s understandable that synthetic fabric fibers fill the racks of these thrift stores. Thrifting allows for fashionistas to keep up with micro-trends at an affordable price, as they “recycle” their wardrobe as often as the trends change, dumping their out-of-style and low-quality clothing into these highly populated stores. Alongside the low-price tag leveraging customers, the ability to donate these thrifted clothes again only enables individuals to have a guilt-free shopping experience. Anna Fitzpatrick, a project coordinator at the London College of Fashion’s Centre for Sustainable Fashion, explains that “thrifting feeds off the instability and unsustainability of the fast fashion industry.” She continues to debunk the phenomenon that thrifting is indubitably sustainable by clarifying that the sizable nature of the secondhand market is due to the rapid development of these low-quality clothes. As racks are being filled with relatively inexpensive clothing from brands such as Shein and H&M, the cycle continues as these fast fashion brands make more clothes rather than slow down their production. Even though there should be an inverse correlation between the overproduction of fast fashion clothing and increased thrifting, the opposite is apparent. The continuation of “recycling” low-quality garments only allows fast fashion companies to overproduce as thrift stores merely serve to dissolve the “ethical” shoppers’ accountability.

The quality of items in thrift stores has declined dramatically as the influx of fast fashion clothing is being recirculated and ending up in landfills faster. Due to the increased quantity of clothing being created, undesirable clothing (usually cheap in production and quality) swamps the secondhand market. As higher quality clothing can sustain a longer wear test, the congestion of lower quality clothing in secondhand stores impedes the ability for thrifted clothing to become a staple wardrobe item. When companies prioritize quickly putting out trendy styles over the quality of their clothing, they compromise valuable craftsmanship, resulting in the use of cheap materials, such as polyester, with the knowledge that these products will stand little use of wear. The consumer mentality is equally important to note: the lack of value in their cheap thrifted clothing leads to negligence in caring for their clothing. The privilege of buying such affordable clothing — inadequate in quality — discourages customers from extending the duration of its’ use Contrary to their ideal intention, “there is a flood of unwanted clothes moving through the secondhand clothing system.” The microtrends circulating the fashion industry today are at an all-time low, where once trendy clothes are “inadmissible” (through the eyes of the fashion industry) in a matter of months. Although, in theory, thrifting prompts the ability to buy undesirable clothes from one owner to another chance, the sharp decrease in quality and ever-so-changing trends, in practice, negates this purpose. As thrifters recycle their closets by donating their old clothing so they can buy an entirely new wardrobe of secondhand clothes, they neglect to realize that only a small percentage of their donations are sold in stores. According to Popular Science, “out of the bag of donations you drop off at Goodwill, only around ten to twenty percent will be displayed under the fluorescent lights.” With only a small percentage of clothing donated out for sale, the remaining clothing is shipped to other countries to be made into rags and other highly processed products, if not incarcerated or ending up in landfills. The decomposition of textiles creates “greenhouse methane gas and releases toxic chemicals and dyes into the groundwater and soil.” While one may assume that their old clothing is recycled and the fabrics are transformed into new clothing, it presents an energy-intensive task. This is exacerbated by modern garments made of mixed fibers since “sorting textiles into different fibers and material types by hand is labor intensive, slow and requires a skilled workforce.” This discourages companies from recycling clothing as seen by the fact that only one percent of used clothing gets recycled. Therefore, most of the old garments are torn up to be used for industrial purposes. Likewise, as most of the unwanted clothing in the United States is exported to other countries, the large amount of transportation leads to the emission of greenhouse gasses and air pollutants. Donators’ initial assumption is that these clothes are going to be reused, however, 80–90% of donations are either turned into post-consumer fibers, rotting in our landfills or consuming more energy and water waste through their transformation.

Although the operational constraints of physical thrift stores are resolved by e-commerce resale applications, online thrifting also exacerbates the cycle of excessive consumption and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. With the rise of online resale stores such as Depop and Poshmark, users can easily buy and sell their secondhand clothing. Following the trend in the e-commerce industry, it is no surprise that the efficiency of e-commerce has infiltrated the resale market. While buying secondhand clothes online eliminates the issue of floor space constraints, it enables overconsumption in the same manner–if not more due to the convenience of online shopping–as physical thrift stores. E-commerce resale apps encourage overconsumption as consumers can frequently buy and discard their purchases. Rather than addressing the issues of overproduction and consumption in the fashion industry, consumers are more simply frequently purchasing used products, which additionally contributes to the generation of transportation emission. Shipping in the retail industry, through nitrogen pollution and greenhouse gas, is one the most infamous contributors to the decline of the environment. As it is infrequent that consumers buy more than one article of clothing in a package due to the limited selection of online retailers, there are greater effects of shipping from online.

Additionally, the e-commerce resale market has become a profitable business with individuals and companies capitalizing off of greenwashing their products and limiting secondhand clothing to be exclusive. For the secondhand market to be successful, in terms of sustainability, it must be feasible for everyone. The increased demand for thrift stores has struck an entrepreneurial spirit in individuals, as they search for quality pieces in stores and resell them for a higher price. Online resale apps are flooded with up-priced thrifted clothing. The online resale market has become a lucrative business, as these nifty shoppers are able to find items in high demand to resell online. This resale market further encourages individuals to buy items that they are not going to use, but rather allows them to profit off their surplus purchases. Individuals market items that they purchase for a mere ten dollars and resell for thirty dollars as they add value with the phrases: “vintage” and “thrifted.” Alongside the continued raises in thrift stores due to the increase in operational costs and demand, these resellers take away many of the higher-demand, quality items that are a necessity for some. Sustainability used to be a means for individuals who were unable to afford expensive fabrics, however, the decrease of fast fashion garments and increase in secondhand clothing causes the low-income community to reject buying from second hand stores as “several clothing items from low-cost brands like…were priced at $15 to $20 [which is] what you might expect to spend when you shop directly from these stores.” The capitalization of the demand for thrifted items has only caused a limitation in its consumer base showing its reduction of viability to be a solution to combat the fast fashion industry.

While thrifting, as it currently exists, does not yield a sustainable outcome, conscientiously purchasing second hand clothing is beneficial to the environment. Rather than trying to utilize thrift stores as a means to feel environmentally conscious, the real change must occur in the consumer’s capitalist spending habits. The underlying issue of both fast fashion and thrifting is overconsumption and shopping for items that are neither high-quality nor long-lasting. Rather than purchasing low-quality, cheap clothing, prioritization of clothing that will stand the wear of time and be a staple in one’s wardrobe, will allow individuals to “get the most bang for [their] environmental buck.” Although spending more money on quality pieces is a luxury that some individuals can afford, it’s not entirely necessary in order to shop sustainably. Unnecessary purchases are the ultimate contributor to greenhouse gasses. Green materialism is still materialism; therefore, using the “green” label as an alibi for making impulsive purchases ultimately leads to the same result as overconsumption of fast fashion. Alongside purchasing items that will last, moderating the environmental cost of delivery by planning ahead and consolidating purchases also assists in eliminating impulsive purchases. Besides the impractical solution of not owning clothing, the most sustainable way of shopping is upcycling and mending clothing that already exists in one’s closet. Considering that fashion trends often follow a cyclical pattern, the trends in fashion are not sacrificed for this sustainable approach. However, as society’s improvements in shopping habits can urge corporations to slow down overproduction, it is a tenuous assertion to believe that major enterprises will be willing to relinquish their substantial profits in the name of environmental preservation.

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