The retail industry is no stranger to striving for sustainability success. As a focal point for consumers, brands, and policymakers alike, there is a keen sense of awareness regarding the environmental and social implications of fast fashion. People are opening their minds to the possibilities of alternative means to express their individuality through style—without ignoring their values.
By exemplifying ethical fashion consumption, thrift culture is rising in the ranks of sustainability in retail. Thrifting allows companies and consumers to ease environmental footprint concerns—from textile waste to greenhouse gas emissions—by promoting the three Rs: reduce, reuse, and recycle. This, in turn, creates a more circular economy that propels resource usage efficiency and ethical labor and production practices.
The Environmental Impact of Fast Fashion
Characterized by rapid production cycles and lower prices, fast fashion has emerged as an ever-growing trend in the retail landscape—much to the detriment of the environment and society. As people lean more toward convenience in consumption, clothing becomes scarcely worn before being discarded and replaced, wasting the natural resources required to create these garments. Unfortunately, this practice highlights the exploitative labor processes linked with fast fashion.
Retailers that subscribe to fast fashion, like Zara, Forever 21, and H&M, tend to put out 12 to 15 collections annually in response to changing trends and consumer behaviors. To keep up with these demands, such retailers outsource cheap labor and materials from garment-producing countries to keep consumer costs low—freeing them to purchase more. As a result, the fashion industry is now the second-highest contributor to global pollution, accounting for 10% of humankind’s entire carbon emissions, while 85% of textiles are wasted in landfills.
In the garment-making process, 36% of global pollution is credited to dyeing and finishing clothing. In addition, fiber production is highlighted as the biggest contributor to freshwater withdrawal and ecosystem quality due to cotton cultivation. In fact, textile production creates 1.2 billion tonnes worth of greenhouse gas emissions and is estimated to skyrocket by more than 60% by 2030.
How Thrifting Mitigates Environmental Impact
In response, the fashion industry is shifting closer toward thrifting—the practice of acquiring clothing from second-hand stores, estate sales, or online marketplaces—as the norm. As a sustainable alternative, more consumers opt for brands that emphasize ethical production and resource conservation.
Thrifting empowers people to extend the lifespan of clothing while helping fashion retailers minimize their environmental impact. By purchasing second-hand clothing, consumers lessen new production demand, thus saving energy, water, and raw materials. Thrifting also promotes the pillars of reduce, reuse, and recycle. Not only does this decrease resource consumption, but it also empowers apparel manufacturers to reduce carbon emissions, landfill waste, and chemical pollution, keeping products in circulation for longer periods of time.In the same light, thrift culture boosts a circular economy, which aims to reduce waste by recovering a product’s resources at the end of its lifecycle and siphoning them back into production. With an emphasis on sustainable consumption, thrifting also appeals to policymakers, such as the European Commission considering an extension for textile producer responsibilities across the European Union by 2025. Economically, secondhand garments are often placed at more affordable price points in comparison to their newer counterparts and reduce retailers’ material footprints.
The Social Impact of Thrifting
This signifies a significant cultural and social shift across generations, most notably for Gen Z—who use thrifting as an eco-conscious form of entertainment that builds a greater sense of community. Recently, traditional thrift stores have been challenged by increasing competition from resellers, despite these retailers inflating prices. So, how can these thrift establishments ensure their eco-friendly envisioning of the fashion industry can still be upheld?
Jump On Board with Growing Online
Today’s digital-centric way of operating—both personally and professionally—necessitates thrift stores to establish a solid online presence. To do so, thrift stores need to establish user-friendly websites and maintain an active and engaging social media profile. Posting high-quality images of new stock and sharing satisfactory customer reviews makes it easier to generate buzz and cater to a larger audience. But, this doesn’t mean the end for brick-and-mortar stores; embracing online operations complements the in-person journey and breaks new ground for thrifting potential.
To maintain this momentum, online sites like Poshmark, Depop, and threadUp are experiencing a meteoric rise in the thrifting realm. This is due to the comfort and convenience customers experience when shopping online—with 75% of Poshmark’s consumers preferring this option. On the other side of this coin, people are also finding opportunities to make a profit from pre-owned items by using these sites to resell them—usually in cases where secondhand apparel is initially thrifted at a much lower price than its value.
Put the Unity in Community
With more than 3,300 stores across North America, Goodwill is recognized for its efforts in selling donated clothing and household goods. But did you know its primary mission is to empower job creation for those in need? By leveraging secondhand stores as the currency to support its strategic objective, Goodwill is able to provide training, coaching, and placement opportunities.
With this being said, it’s important to research various charity shop missions before interacting as either a donor or a consumer. While programs, like Goodwill, are a great option, investigating further can lead to initiatives that cater to those wanting to donate clothing directly to economically-disadvantaged community members.
Concluding Thoughts
Take a second to imagine a world where sustainable fashion isn’t a future-forward idea, but an imminent reality. That’s where the fashion industry is right now.
As the sector pivots its progression, the environmental and social impact it creates sends ripples of hope throughout the industry. In the fight to flee from fast fashion, opting for preloved and pre-owned clothing significantly decreases the demand for rapid production of new clothing, thus whittling down textile and landfill waste. Thrift culture not only cuts down on consumer consumption but also reduces the pollution produced as part of the garment-making process.
As an eco-friendly alternative to purchasing clothing, thrift stores also promote a circular economy that emphasizes the tenets of reuse, reduce, and recycle to drive resource efficiency and mitigate retailers’ material and eco footprints. With companies, like Goodwill, leading the way in sustainable consumption, it’s time to follow in their footsteps and shift the tide toward a more eco-conscious consumer culture.
