The pandemic had disrupted fast fashion and slowed it down to a standstill. Now the world gradually opens up with people back to their offices, travelling restrictions lift, and people are ready to socialize. People are ready to dress up again after they have lived a confined and simpler life during the pandemic. And with people realizing the negative impact of fast fashion on the environment and society, brands are compelled to think out of the box to offer them solutions that allow them to grapple with the rising problem of fast fashion. The product configurator software works on a similar model and provides customization solutions to the company so that they manufacture products as per customers' demands and requirements. It is a tool that comes with digital features enabling customers to design their apparel, footwear, headgear, bags, jewelry, and other products seamlessly. They can also preview their customized products using the tool's 3d technology and make final changes in the design before placing the order.
Online Product Designer Enables Fashion Houses to Leap in the Sustainable Race
According to the American Chemical Society, fashion production has doubled since the beginning of the century, and it will likely triple by 2050. The production of polyester, used for much cheap fast fashion and athleisure wear, has increased nine-fold in the last 50 years. Because clothing has gotten so cheap, it is easily discarded after being worn only a few times. One survey found that 20 per cent of clothing in the US is never worn; in the UK, it is 50 per cent. Online shopping, available day and night, has made impulse buying and returning items easier. This makes the fashion industry the biggest contributor to forest fires, rise in the sea level, unfair wages, labor exploitation, and overfilled landfills. Many of the fashion companies would be surprised to know that it takes over 4,000 litres of water to make a pair of jeans, and most of the water used is not even recycled. This figure indicates that fashion is costing one-fifth of all wastewater across the globe. Additionally, the fashion and luxury industry is responsible for 10 per cent of annual global carbon emissions, that's more than all international flights and maritime shipping combined.
According to McKinsey, average consumers are likely to buy 60 per cent more than they did in 2000. And it was reported that for a long time, 41 per cent of young women felt the need to wear something different whenever they left the house. In response, some companies send consumers a box of new clothes every month. The need for sustainable measures was going around the corners in the fashion industry for a long time, but some countable people raised their voices in support of these notions and measures. It is natural for us to succumb to social pressure to conform to attitudes widely accepted by society, often socially claiming that we support these causes even if our actions are not aligned with our claims. This is the primary reason why most people are aware that ethical initiatives are important for a better future; they don't easily deviate from their default behaviour, especially when it offers perks like affordability, style, and convenience. These are the areas where technology can help, and the recent rapid digitization of the supply chain can make all the difference.
Let us explore numerous solutions that will help fashion and luxury companies to become more sustainable.
Educate Consumers about Responsible Consumerism
With the holiday season approaching, many of your customers must have removed their last season's hot fashion products, but not many realize that its effect still lingers, from the energy used in its production to its continued presence in one of the nation's landfills. The total environmental impact of our outfit choices are a growing concern because buoyed by the rise of so-called fast fashion; we're consuming and discarding more clothes than ever before. Understandably, profit is at the core of any business, and fashion companies have to adhere to policies that help garner more profit. However, while earning higher profits, they often overlook the costs our nature has to pay. And in this process, consumers are equally responsible because unless they are educated or made aware of the impacts they have on the environment, it will go in vain no matter what brands do. Since consumers are the king, and if they don't comply with buying more sustainable products, brands will no longer buy them because they don't want to suffer any losses. However, this shouldn't be used as an excuse for brands to not adhere to the recent changes to make the planet a better place to live.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the US generated millions, about 75 pounds per person, of textile waste, most of which ended up in landfills. That's more than a 750 per cent increase since 1960. For reference, that's nearly ten times more than the increase in the country's population over the same period. The growth in clothing waste coincides with the domination of fast fashion companies, such as H&M and Zara, whose business models are based on selling low-priced items at high volumes. Zara's spokesperson releases 20,000 new designs every year, unveiling new lines during micro seasons beyond the traditional winter/fall and summer/spring lines. The strategy is designed to encourage customers to shop regularly for new looks. However, as these companies shift their bottom line to become more eco-friendly, customers still continue to buy products from them. The brands have initiated various measures and awards that also support the budding designers who are using novel sustainable measures to make this planet a better place. The fashion industry can also learn from the example of Audio Architect Apparel, a leading name in the fashion market especially known for sustainable products, which introduces new products that keep the environment, ecosystems, and local communities at its core.
Audio Architect Apparel believes that fashion should not be fast. The company doesn't want to create garments for people who don't care about the environment we live in; instead, they want a brand held accountable for its actions. According to its owners, contemporary fashion should be sustainable and help support the communities that create it. By purchasing any of their apparel, buyers can rest assured that they are doing all they can to protect our environment and ensure the people in their supply chain are paid properly for their work.
Digitize the Supply Chain for Better and Faster Results
Apart from the moral argument of leaving the planet better for future generations and educating them about the harm they are causing to the environment, brands and retailers now also have to think about a very powerful tool in the industry's arsenal - profits. Indeed, it sounds oxymoron, but all courtesy to the latest digital revolutions, fashion houses now have the potential to unlock profitability sooner and create a significantly more transparent supply chain. Digitization helps companies to remove opacity and middlemen, improve speed, and lower inventory days. This frees up margins and makes favourable changes to the bottom line. It also comes with other significant benefits like transparency, predictability, accountability, and traceability, all of which are critical to creating irreversible positive change in fashion supply chains. Once the entire business model is digitized, manufacturers, brands, and consumers can verify exactly where a product was made, who made the product and how it was made. When sourcing flows are digitized, the same stakeholders can verify whether the fabric was truly ethically sourced and if the material is as sustainable as it is claimed to be. When manufacturing processes are digitized and logged, it is easier for everyone to see and track the carbon footprints and reduce them. It is crucial for ensuring transparency as well. It also ensures quality control, audits, and environmental impacts of the product launched in the market. Additionally, social and governance (ESG) assessments must be digitized; their reports become verifiable and available for all brands and consumers.
We already know that the majority of Gen Z and millennial consumers would prefer to buy sustainable and ethically sourced products at the same price. Many would even pay more for it. But the important catalyst to increase the adoption of ESG-friendly practices is to get brands, manufacturers, and old-school businesses to adopt them. And perhaps the quickest way would be to use digitization-driven-profitability to catalyze, incentivize and encourage it. Likewise, the product design tool allows brands to keep track of what they produce and establish transparency with customers. As customers get the upper hand in designing their fashion products, including shirts, pants, skirts, hats, caps, bags, backpacks, purses, shoes, skaters, rings, necklaces, and many other products, companies are bound to listen and manufacture what has been demanded. The tool bridges the gap between buyers and brands as after its installation on a brand's website, buyers are allowed to customize their products and preview them using 3d technology seamlessly. It also ensures that brands first understand what customers want and accordingly manufacture; they should first understand the demand and then manufacture it; instead of first manufacturing the product and then marketing it. This swapping of processes helps fashion and luxury companies track and grapple with overproduction issues. And since it is a customization solution and appeals most to buyers from all age groups, it offers a platform to display their creativity to the world; customers will be willing to spend more on such experiences. Thus, ensuring businesses earn the profit they deserve for all the hard work they have put in while also balancing and safeguarding nature. In short, it is a perfect blend of two worlds, that is, technology and business.
Emphasize on Re-Use Materials, Off-Cutts, and Fabrics
Fashion is synonymous with creativity and experiment and if brands fail to do anything with already manufactured, unsold, and dumped products, then who will. After working in the ever-evolving industry, designers must stop using virgin resources and think out-of-the-box to surprise and inspire customers and contemporaries. The industry is an incredible source of creatively communicating thoughts to buyers, and with every new collection, a designer can offer customers a new dream, desired aesthetic, and a fresh personality. However, we need to revise the process of dumping the unsold and not worn clothes. The designers should redesign them to bring back the style or inspire the current generation to wear already donned clothes with new twists.
Repurposing old archived stock of material and focusing on experimentation with unconventional materials will create something new. Using materials in this way requires even more innovative design skills and technical knowledge, challenging designers to use this material approach to create refined and timeless pieces. Additionally, in the fashion and luxury industry, brands have a wide range of options for repairing and redesigning in the trendiest fashion. Brands and their buyers can focus on the essential 5 Rs of fashion, reduce, repair, recycle, repurpose, and reinvent. Brands are improving the overall customer experience by providing guidelines to ensure that their purchase lasts for long. Some brands are offering repair facilities for their clothes. Upcycle fashion uses either pre-consumer and post-consumer wastes to manufacture new products. The process reuses old clothes without going through the recycling process.
International demand for Cotton made in Africa (CmiA) Cotton continues to grow. German fashion brand Brax, Jolo Fashion Group from the Netherlands and fashion and lifestyle brand Shinsegae International from South Korea have recently joined the CmiA initiative to promote sustainable cotton cultivation, protect the environment and improve the working and living conditions of small-scale farmers and their families, currently numbering around one million. The fashion industry is going to be more sustainable with repaired, redesigned, and upcycled fashion.
Conclusion-
In a nutshell, becoming a sustainable brand overnight is impossible, and it certainly can't be attained alone. Therefore, all of us should come together and transform our business model to revamp our bottom line. If we don't do anything now, we will regret it for the rest of our lives. If changing your business approach is a daunting task, you must implement the product configurator software by iDesigniBuy. The tool brings the best of both worlds, technology and revenue, to help brands take their business to the next level.
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