The article in the url below suggests the message that fast fashion is increasingly a hard sell for some consumers (due to the huge amount of associated waste) is beginning to make progress:
"Fast-fashion retailers including H&M, Uniqlo and Zara have for years enticed shoppers to buy more and more new clothes. Now these brands are pushing consumers to repair their old ones, too."
More specifically:
"Zara this year is launching nationwide repair services in several of its largest markets, Uniqlo is adding repair studios to a number of stores, and H&M-owned Cos is working with a startup to help customers fix damaged dresses and jackets."
Of course, if the material is lower quality (which is a big part of fast fashion's low cost business model), it might not be repairable. I thought the whole point of Zara was that it made clothes you could wear five times and then discard (see Strategic CSR – Fast fashion):
"While some high-end brands have long offered to fix pricier products, the large-scale rollout of repair services is a new venture for mainstream fashion retailers whose clothes are typically much cheaper. The trend could also threaten to cannibalize sales of new products."
Somehow, I think it will be the other way around and customers will ignore the repair option. Given that the price of labor drives repair costs, it is probably going to be cheaper to buy replacements than it will be to repair items that might not last much longer, anyway:
"In the U.K., Zara takes in garments for repair and handles payments, but uses a network of third-party repairers to do the work. Mending a hole, for example, costs £10, equivalent to roughly $13."
I would think you could buy half of the items in a typical fast fashion store for that price – certainly among companies such as Shein and Boohoo (see Strategic CSR – Shein + Boohoo).
Take care
David
David Chandler
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H&M, Zara and Fast-Fashion Peers Are Pushing Into Repair Services
By Trefor Moss
August 2, 2023
The Wall Street Journal
Late Edition – Final
B1-2
