We really need a better industry around re-use of essentially everything.
Let's say I need some X. Last week I bought a base layer because it's getting cold here.
I can order, or buy in a store, a brand new X trivially. I don't actually need a brand new X. A used X would do me just fine.
But the difficulty in doing so is ridiculous in comparison. Cottage industry eBay stuff (that you have to order online) vs. an entire infrastructure built around producing and selling new stuff.
Thredup/Grailed/TheRealReal/Etsy/Rent the Runway are bigger companies in that business.
Amazon also sells 'Warehouse deals' of returned product at a discount.
There are also chains of 'buy/sell/trade' stores like Buffalo Exchange, and many local vintage and consignment stores.
But there are significant challenges when you introduce all the ways that used products can deteriorate, plus the challenge of discovery and managing a stock that can potentially include 'everything ever produced in history' rather than 'this season's SKUs'. Plus the 'Market for Lemons' issue that many people generally get rid of things when they've failed somehow, and only sometimes is the issue 'I don't like this thing's style anymore'.
I generally thrift & vintage stores more interesting than new clothing stores, and enjoy the thrill you get when you find something you could never find new for a very good price, but the tradeoff is that it takes significant effort to find clean reliable basics in your size in the used market, as people generally keep those things until they wear out, and it's basically impossible to keep a full size run of anything used in stock.
Just wanted to shout out grailed! It's become my go-to for tees. Awesome brands and vintage stuff is really cheap and the sellers are generally pretty honest and good.
If you really want to do go down this path I would highly recommend Patagonia wornwear. They get a lot of hate for their prices but they are trying to be as sustainable as possible. The Ironclad guarantee is one of the best.
eBay is full of their used stuff and some neat retro gear.
Neat. Didn't know Patagonia had that. Though, truth be told, the Patagonia clothing I could potentially buy used probably lasts me so long that I don't really need any more.
The main driver is “fast fashion” and things that don’t last long. They both require making new things -things which require intensive natural resource usage, either natural fibers or synthetic.
A crappy shirt or dress can’t get upcycled or recycled whatever. It ends up in a dump and people need to buy new fashionable stuff.
Movies, TV shows, celebrities and currently [social media] influencers are the ones creating this demand, sometimes with their own overpriced crappy brands.
What about thrift stores or organizations like Goodwill? Those places have lots of secondhand clothes, houseware, and small appliances.
You might have trouble finding a used A/C in the middle of July, and you might have to try a few locations to find what you're looking for, but it's less trouble than plenty of stuff that people do to be more eco-friendly.
Second hand stores are really hit and miss and I find one needs to sort of drop in regularly to find the good stuff. But when you do find the stuff you need it is at an unbelievable price. I just bought 2 snow suits for my kids plus a small blender and it was less then 10$ Canadian. A new snow suit which they would out grow in a season would cost 50$.
>But the difficulty in doing so is ridiculous in comparison
Buying a used base layer on eBay is not ridiculously difficult as compared to buying a new one from other online retailers. Amazon is certainly easier but compared to going to an online store like REI, I'd say it is comparable.
Are you saying that the brick and mortar stores? REI I believe has used gear in their brick and mortar store, the selection is probably going to be all over the place but I'm not sure how a single store would guarantee a used stock. I think their used inventory is listed online. There's also good will and other consignment shops and things like that.
I'm wondering if what you really want is better marketing for used services to increase awareness. That seems pretty legit. Maybe there's an opportunity there to really blast out a marketing/propaganda campaign to get this concept burned into consumer's minds?
Buying used clothes online quickly runs headfirst into decision fatigue, incomplete information, and a lack of good filtering.
Walk into an REI and there might be five or ten choices, all probably pretty good, and you can try them on right there and read reviews and specs and information about the materials.
On eBay there are probably (I'm guessing) millions of nondescript black base layers in any number of condition, with an enormous range of fits for the same "size", fabric of unknown type & performance, total lack of reviews, etc.
It's an interesting sort of problem. There's surely countless garments that would suit you fine for a tiny amount of money, but finding them in the ocean of garments that would not is a miserable chore.
Imagine that half the population is wearing the same wardrobe of cloths, and buying used ones when they wear out. The other half buys new outfits every couple of days, discarding items after wearing them a handful of times.
The first group will never consume enough cloths to make use of what the second group discards.
There is a massive reuse culture out there. It's just not been industrialized by a handful of companies or chased after by VCs. For clothes there are garage sales, second hand shops, and donations to those who are less fortunate (e.g., to the growing size of the group at or below the poverty line).
Part of the problem is the number of clothes that don't last long. They are expensive and wear out quickly.
Another part of it is culture. How many people can pull off wearing clothes from 10 or 20 years ago without being judged for doing so.
This is a larger problem than sharing and availability. It's cultural.
I'd settle for better data before we start burning down the clothing industry. 10% of global carbon from clothes seems unlikely. No source with data cited in the article, or the article that is cited.
Well, for one, that would vastly reduce economic growth. But aside from that, there’s not many things that fit X in the scheme of things you purchase frequently. Packaging / containers of consumed items is a big one. Fashion might be but probably not.
The example I hear a lot for some reason is power tools. Yeah it would be great to share power tools because you only need them once or twice... but you only buy them once or twice otherwise. It’s a good idea to help poor communities consolidate resources but it’s hard to help large communities reduce their eco foot prints
Fast fashion is bad. But I think the broken window fallacy is poorly matched to modern times. It’s useful to demonstrate why war is bad even if it boosts our GDP, but there’s so much nuance to things like repairs, obsolescence, globalism, switching costs, etc.
If something is bad for economic growth, whose growth matters? Ecological arguments are perhaps one of the better things to consider because at the end of the day it may kill everyone. shrug
The broken window fallacy requires forcefully destroying someone’s property to get them to replace it with the same thing. This doesn’t fit that model at all.
> Well, for one, that would vastly reduce economic growth.
Yes, that's the point! I take the world without the economic growth where people are happy with what they have over one with economic growth and unsustainable level of CO2 emissions.
Not to start an argument, but that's easy to say when you have a comfortable life and already experienced abundance.
You know, people of poor and underdeveloped countries have the right to aspire to a better life (and yes, that means owning more than a couple of ragged t-shirts and eat meat often than twice a month)
Genuine question from an ignorance of macroeconomics:
Wouldn't the money going to clothing just go to something else? It's not like the workers or company owners would sit on their hands when fashion stops being profitable.
The money would go into something else, but it would probably be something stupid. A lot of the dumb startups we see now that are burning cash on obviously bad strategies exist because at a global financial scale, there’s not enough opportunities to invest all of the capital in. There’s obviously lots (LOTS) of work to be done that could use capital still but current financial system want to believe in a high rate of return so they look to things like Uber. Note, Uber’s of the world are a drop in the bucket still, but the symptom is growing in prevalence. This is also not to say that fast fashion is a good idea or an efficient use of resources. It’s not.
The people... well this hypothetical is extreme so it’s hard to say. But populations of workers have been abandoned in the past before and it varies. It’s fully believable that they would just not have anything to do and would... idk... protest.
If people are spending it on ‘something stupid’ that’s is a sign that resources are unequally and inefficiently distributes. There are plenty of people in the world who would spend additional cash on food or fuel.
I mean, would you order online, and then have it shipped to you?
That might be an improvement over what we have now? But I suspect that it's hardly ideal. Unless you were geographically restricted in what you could order. (ie - No ordering some wiz-bang base layers from a family that happens to be in Norway when you live in Minneapolis.)
vinokilo.com if you are in Europe, they also have events in cities where they fill a space with sorted clothing and blast music way too loud (so bring earplugs)
Nice idea but the fun of vintage clothes shopping is having a few hours with nothing better to do than trying on the umpteenth ugly sweater/velvet jacket/vintage dress until you find one that looks better than one you can find in 15 minutes on the high street. Buying online is totally meaningless in the space.
Let's say I need some X. Last week I bought a base layer because it's getting cold here.
I can order, or buy in a store, a brand new X trivially. I don't actually need a brand new X. A used X would do me just fine.
But the difficulty in doing so is ridiculous in comparison. Cottage industry eBay stuff (that you have to order online) vs. an entire infrastructure built around producing and selling new stuff.