Key Insights
Essential data points from our research
The fashion industry is responsible for 10% of annual global carbon emissions, more than all international flights and maritime shipping combined
The fashion industry produces about 20% of global waste water
It takes about 2,700 liters of water to make just one cotton shirt, which is enough water for one person to drink for 2.5 years
The equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned every second
Less than 1% of material used to produce clothing is recycled into new clothing
92 million tonnes of textile waste is created annually globally
Approximately 1 in 6 people in the world work in a fashion-related job
93% of brands surveyed by Fashion Checker do not pay garment workers a living wage
80% of garment workers worldwide are women aged 18-35
Consumers bought 60% more clothing in 2014 than in 2000, but kept each garment for half as long
33% of women consider clothes "old" after wearing them fewer than three times
One in three young women in the UK consider a garment worn once or twice to be 'old'
Global clothing production doubled between 2000 and 2014, breaking 100 billion garments for the first time
The fast fashion market size was valued at $106 billion in 2022
Ultra-fast fashion brands like Shein release up to 6,000 new styles every single day
Consumer Behavior
- Consumers bought 60% more clothing in 2014 than in 2000, but kept each garment for half as long
- 33% of women consider clothes "old" after wearing them fewer than three times
- One in three young women in the UK consider a garment worn once or twice to be 'old'
- Social media 'hauls' drive consumption: #SheinHaul has over 10 billion views on TikTok
- 42% of consumers say they have returned clothing items they bought online, contributing to shipping waste
- The average garment is worn only 7 to 10 times before being discarded
- 20% of unsold clothes in consumers' wardrobes have never been worn
- Gen Z consumers engage with fast fashion apps 40% more frequently than older generations
- 50% of consumers would switch brands if offered a recycling buy-back program
- 1 in 6 young people say they wouldn't feel comfortable wearing the same outfit again if it had been pictured on social media
- Impulse buying accounts for close to 40% of fashion purchases among younger demographics
- Secondhand shopping is growing 11 times faster than traditional retail
- 72% of consumers prefer to buy eco-friendly brands, but only 22% actually do so due to price barriers
- The average American buys 68 items of clothing a year
- 1 in 10 shoppers admit to buying clothes solely for social media posts and returning them
- Consumers in the UK keep clothing for approximately 2.2 years on average before discarding
- Demand for raw materials by consumers is expected to triple by 2050
- Online return rates for clothing are approximately 30-40%, much higher than brick-and-mortar stores
- The 'wear it once' culture is responsible for a loss of $460 billion of value each year
- Over 50% of fast fashion items purchased are thrown away within one year
Interpretation
Fast fashion has turned closets into disposable galleries, as social-media-fueled hauls and impulse buys push people to buy far more clothes, wear each piece far fewer times, return and discard vast volumes, waste hundreds of billions of dollars and enormous natural resources, while many who would prefer eco-friendly brands are simply priced out.
Environmental Impact
- The fashion industry is responsible for 10% of annual global carbon emissions, more than all international flights and maritime shipping combined
- The fashion industry produces about 20% of global waste water
- It takes about 2,700 liters of water to make just one cotton shirt, which is enough water for one person to drink for 2.5 years
- Textile dyeing is the second largest polluter of water globally
- Cotton farming is responsible for 24% of insecticides and 11% of pesticides globally despite using only 3% of the world's arable land
- Synthetic fibers like polyester rely on fossil fuel extraction and are projected to account for 73% of total fiber production by 2030
- The apparel industry's global emissions will increase by 50% by 2030 if current growth paths continue
- Making a pair of jeans produces as much greenhouse gases as driving a car for more than 80 miles
- Livestock reared for leather and wool release vast amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas 28 times more potent than carbon dioxide
- 70 million barrels of oil are used each year to make the world’s polyester fiber
- Viscose production contributes to deforestation has led to the logging of 150 million trees annually
- The carbon footprint of a single polyester shirt is approximately 5.5 kg CO2e, compared to 2.1 kg CO2e for a cotton shirt
- Fashion production accounts for 35% of oceanic primary microplastic pollution
- Highly toxic chemicals like mercury and arsenic are frequently used in textile processing and released into waterways
- If the fashion industry were a country, its emissions would rank almost equal to the entire European continent
- Up to 20,000 chemicals are used in textile production, many of which differ in toxicity and complicate recycling
- Growing cotton accounts for 2.6% of the global water footprint
- Leather tanning is often done with chromium, creating toxic sludge that poisons groundwater in production countries
- The apparel industry uses 93 billion cubic meters of water annually, enough to meet the needs of five million people
- By 2050, the fashion industry could use vastly more than 26% of the carbon budget associated with a 2-degree Celsius pathway
Interpretation
Fast fashion may make us look good for a season, but behind the bargain prices it is dressing the planet in carbon, chemicals and microplastics—responsible for roughly 10 percent of global emissions, massive water waste and toxic dye pollution, rampant deforestation and an addiction to oil-based fibers that could consume a quarter of the 2°C carbon budget and leave ecosystems and communities permanently stained.
Industry Economics
- Global clothing production doubled between 2000 and 2014, breaking 100 billion garments for the first time
- The fast fashion market size was valued at $106 billion in 2022
- Ultra-fast fashion brands like Shein release up to 6,000 new styles every single day
- The global apparel market is valued at approximately $1.5 trillion
- Polyester production has grown nine-fold in the last 50 years to become the dominant fiber
- The number of garments produced annually is expected to reach 200 billion by 2030
- Lead times for fast fashion have dropped from 6 months to as little as 2 weeks from design to shelf
- The fast fashion market is projected to reach $185 billion by 2027
- Almost 60% of all clothing produced is now made from synthetic fibers (plastics)
- Fast fashion brands have increased the number of "seasons" from 2 per year to 52 micro-seasons per year
- The top 20 fashion companies create 97% of the industry's economic profit
- Global footwear production reached 24.3 billion pairs in 2019
- The cost of producing clothing has decreased, allowing prices to remain flat despite inflation
- E-commerce share of fashion sales rose from 16% to 29% globally during the pandemic years
- Shein surpassed Amazon as the most downloaded shopping app in the US in 2021
- China remains the largest exporter of textiles, accounting for 32% of the global total
- The resale market is projected to be double the size of fast fashion by 2030
- Production of man-made cellulosic fibers (like viscose) has doubled in the last 30 years
- Unsold inventory costs the US retail industry $50 billion a year
- The global market for sustainable fashion is expected to grow at a CAGR of 9% reaching $8 billion by 2023
Interpretation
Fast fashion has become a high speed conveyor belt of mostly plastic clothes, flooding the market with billions of garments faster than ever and poised to hit 200 billion by 2030, compressing design cycles to weeks and letting apps and ultrafast brands debut thousands of styles daily while a tiny cohort of companies pockets almost all the profit, and though resale and sustainable fashion are growing, they remain the only plausible brakes on an industry whose scale, falling costs, and mounting unsold inventory threaten both wallets and the planet.
Labor and Ethics
- Approximately 1 in 6 people in the world work in a fashion-related job
- 93% of brands surveyed by Fashion Checker do not pay garment workers a living wage
- 80% of garment workers worldwide are women aged 18-35
- The fashion industry is the second biggest risk category for modern slavery in the supply chain
- In Bangladesh, the minimum wage for garment workers is roughly $75 per month, covering only a fraction of the cost of living
- Child labor is used in the cotton cultivation or garment production of at least 18 countries
- 56% of fashion brands in a 2022 study could not demonstrate they have a policy to ban forced labor
- Garment workers often work 14 to 16 hours a day, 7 days a week, during peak season
- Less than 2% of clothing workers globally earn a fair living wage
- Union busting and violence against worker leaders is reported in 35% of major garment producing countries
- The Rana Plaza collapse in 2013 killed 1,134 garment workers, highlighting unsafe infrastructure
- Many fast fashion supply chains utilize sub-contracting, making it difficult to trace labor violations
- In some production regions, chemicals used in factories have increased cancer rates in local communities and workers
- Forced labor of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region of China is linked to 1 in 5 cotton garments globally
- Wage theft (non-payment for work done) robbed garment workers of $500 million during the COVID-19 pandemic
- Only 5% of major fashion brands publish a list of their raw material suppliers
- Gender-based violence and harassment affects up to 75% of women in some garment supply chains
- Home-based workers in the fashion supply chain often earn 50% less than factory workers for the same task
- 54% of sustainability claims by fashion brands are rated as "unsubstantiated" or misleading (Greenwashing)
- Top CEOs in fashion earn in 4 days what a female garment worker in Bangladesh earns in her lifetime
Interpretation
Fast fashion may clothe one in six people worldwide, but it does so by relying on mostly young women paid a pittance, forced and child labor in some regions, brutal hours, poisoned communities, union-busting and violence, opaque supply chains and rampant greenwashing, while CEOs earn in days what workers make in a lifetime, turning every "bargain" into a moral debt.
Waste and Pollution
- The equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned every second
- Less than 1% of material used to produce clothing is recycled into new clothing
- 92 million tonnes of textile waste is created annually globally
- Washing clothes releases 500,000 tons of microfibers into the ocean each year, the equivalent of 50 billion plastic bottles
- The average American generates 82 pounds of textile waste each year
- Clothing utilization has decreased by 36% globally compared to 15 years ago, meaning clothes are trash faster
- 85% of all textiles go to the dump each year
- 30% of clothes produced continuously each season are never sold and are often incinerated
- Textile waste is anticipated to increase by about 60% between 2015 and 2030
- Only 12% of material used for clothing ends up being recycled in some form (mostly downcycled to insulation)
- In the Atacama Desert in Chile, approximately 39,000 tons of unwanted clothing are dumped annually
- Synthetic microfibers have been found in the deepest parts of the ocean and in Arctic ice
- 60% of consumers throw away their clothes rather than donate or recycle them
- The volume of textile waste generated in the United States alone has increased by 811% between 1960 and 2015
- Exported used clothing often ends up polluting receipt countries; 40% of imported used clothes in Ghana are discarded as waste
- Polyester takes between 20 and 200 years to decompose in a landfill
- Incinerating synthetic clothes releases microplastics and toxic emissions into the air
- Fast fashion items often lose shape or quality after just a few washes requiring disposal
- Footwear makes up a significant portion of landfill waste and can take up to 1,000 years to decompose due to EVA compounds
- Global textile waste is expected to weigh 148 million tons by 2030
Interpretation
Fast fashion has turned our wardrobes into a global waste engine, converting cheap trends into a garbage truck of textiles landfilled or burned every second, spewing billions of microfibers into the ocean, ensuring polyester and shoes outlive generations while less than one percent of material is reborn as new clothing and tens of millions of tons pile up each year.
References
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