Better Future Conference: Can fair fashion change the world?

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There is more to every piece of clothing than the decision to pull something out of the wardrobe in the morning.

The clothing industry is one of the largest polluting industries in the world.

According to a recent McKinsey report, it is responsible for around four percent of the world's greenhouse gases emitted every year - as much CO2 as Germany, Great Britain and France together emit.

Then there are the often precarious working conditions of those who manufacture our clothing: eight years ago the Rana Plaza textile factory in Bangladesh collapsed, killing over 1,000 people.

It was a turning point for the industry, and since then nobody has been able to turn a blind eye to these circumstances.

It has long been clear that there has to be a rethink.

Buzzwords such as “sustainability”, “fair fashion” and “eco fashion” are increasingly appearing in the fashion cosmos.

But how can change become tangible?

How can and must he change himself?

Away from the eco image

This was discussed by the entrepreneur Julia Zirpel, who founded the online market place thewearness.com for sustainable luxury fashion in 2017, Henrike Hedel, who is currently developing the Clarry software with the Axel Springer Ideation Council, Linda Ahrens, founder of the start-up Unown and Markus Löning, from 2010 to 2014 Federal Government Commissioner for Human Rights Policy and Humanitarian Aid. Today he advises companies on how to combine economic thinking and compliance with human rights in the production chain. “In fair fashion, everything has to come together: look, manufacture, price. Then fashion becomes more radiant, ”said Julia Zirpel. This is also one of the reasons why she founded her online shop: “For a long time there was this prejudice that sustainable fashion only existed in an eco-friendly look. I wanted to refute that.We work with small labels that are not available everywhere. We have to learn to appreciate our clothes again, and that only works if you develop a relationship with an item of clothing, learn to love it and want to wear it as often as possible. "

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But does that mean that fair fashion has to cost more? A public vote showed that for 60 percent of those surveyed, the look of an item of clothing was decisive for the purchase decision - after all, for 30 percent the fair production conditions. "That fits very well into the current mood," said Markus Löning. “The sustainability debate has reached the masses,” the industry giants know that they have to do something. The change is also being driven by the Supply Chain Act, which is to oblige companies with 3,000 or more employees in Germany from 2023 to provide information about production processes and to set up complaints. “This law will work like a turbo: there is no turning back. Incidentally, sustainability is becoming a decisive factor for many investors - because why should one invest in companiesthat are not ready for the future? ", says Löning.

Circular models as a shopping alternative

Linda Ahrens shows how a sustainable business concept can work.

Your impact start-up Unown offers an online service for fashion: borrow it, send it back, borrow something else.

“We try to use the usual shopping mechanisms, that is, this feeling of: I need something new in my wardrobe.” You make an alternative offer.

“If we continue as we have done up to now, in 15 years we will reach the limits of our planet's capacity.

So we have to find ways to deal with what is already there. ”One approach here could be to keep items of clothing in circulation for as long as possible.

Henrike Hedel and her team are currently developing the Clarry software, which should show at a glance how sustainable an item of clothing offered in online shops is.

“We need to make it easier for shoppers to make informed decisions,” she said.

"It cannot be that you have to spend hours independently gathering information about a brand to make sure that a shoe or pair of trousers has been manufactured under reasonable conditions." In addition to more sustainable product alternatives, your software should also display second-hand offers in the future, to extend the product cycle.

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The question of whether and how fair fashion can change the world was asked at the end of the group. Could the pandemic that turned the industry upside down in its previous production and sales processes create a disruptive moment? After all, trend researchers like Matthias Horx and Li Edelkoort are convinced that a green, more sustainable age awaits us. "During the lockdown months, many people cleared out their closets and realized that having too many possessions also weighed on them," says Linda Ahrens. "I think this knowledge will have an effect on us." Löning also believes that Corona could be the starting signal for a more sustainable age: "Many fashion companies have noticed how much they have made themselves dependent on opaque supply chains and what problems they face brought the crisis.So now they have to consider whether in the future they should work with partners with whom a long-term, reliable vision of sustainability can be drawn up. "

How do you build a fair business? This question was also discussed at the BETTER FUTURE CONFERENCE in the ICONIST podcast The Real Word; the moderators Nicola Erdmann and Julia Hackober spoke to model and founder Sara Nuru about their fair coffee start-up Nuru Coffee: