Fashion and shopping seem like frivolous things to indulge openly in these days. Firstly, there isn’t anywhere to go, and secondly, it seems wasteful since we are living in uncertain times and these would technically be considered as non-essential items and activities.
However, I have personally bought stuff from brick and mortar stores and from one online retailer during my two months of confinement. With discounts being so tempting and the constant longing for the excitement of having the chance to wear something new, it was almost impossible to pass up.
I preferred going to the stores, which is surprising since pre-pandemic my first option was to just get it online. While part of it has to do with seeing human interaction, another part was just my little way of doing something to stimulate the economy.
Very often when we see the glamorous clothes and the lightning fast trends it is easy to see the fashion industry as anything but frivolous. Nevertheless, the truth is it is an industry like any other which will face the aftershocks of the pandemic. It is hard to imagine the garment workers in India, sales assistants on the shop floor or the online visual merchandiser, because everything about this industry currently feels temporary and disposable. Clothing has become so cheap and accessible it has overridden the broader reality of the industry
I recently discovered a website called Lost Stock. Its aim is to remove the blind eye often placed on the garment workers. With many retailers cancelling their orders many workers have been left without a job and money. In Bangladesh alone, orders to the value of approximately $3.5 billon have been cancelled. Apart from this, approximately 135,000 tonnes of new clothes have been consigned to landfill.
Lost Stock will operate as an intermediary between garment workers and unwanted clothes. With a random selection of mostly tops and shirts from brands such as Gap and Topshop, Lost Stock retails each garment box at £35. This is half of what it would usually retail at. The sale of every box is said to support one garment worker for a week.
Apart from seeming like a gamble, since you can’t choose, the Lost Stock service is something that goes beyond seeing fashion as needless. Rather, it is a pioneer in helping us humanize it. With shipping limited to within the UK only for now, it will be exciting to see if garment workers would like to deal with consumer themselves, after all a chance at a higher profit is likely.
