pros and cons of sustainable fashion
what is sustainable fashion?
This fashion movement aims for sustainability in the fashion industry, strongly opposing Fast Fashion, a terrible business model that produces 10% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions and 20% of global wastewaters, polluting our rivers and seas. This planet-killing business practice is also responsible for the buy-n-throw and excessive consumerism culture that pollutes our soil and waters with tons of textile waste, as 85% of all Fast Fashion garments are thrown each year.
This anti-fast fashion movement differs from Slow Fashion in the path it takes to achieve sustainability in the fashion industry, while Slow Fashion focuses more on clothes that are produced with slower manufacturing cycles, fair trade, and supporting smaller businesses, while also caring for the sustainability and quality of its garments, Sustainable Fashion puts a little more weight in the ecological impact of its clothes, using organic, recycled materials like organic ring-spun cotton and other environmentally-friendly biodegradable materials.
At the end of the day, all these anti-fast fashion movements want to achieve the same thing, they just differ in the path they take and on what they consider more important. For example, Ethical Fashion focuses more on the welfare of textile workers, who are exploited in the Fast Fashion industry with inhumane wages and terrible working conditions, many times reaching modern slavery.
greatest benefits of sustainable fashion
This sustainable anti-fast fashion movement has a lot of pros, a lot of benefits for you as a customer, and for everybody as citizens of planet earth. Having said this, here are the greatest benefits of Sustainable Fashion:
- It aims to reduce the big environmental footprint of the fashion industry, which is currently destroying our planet at an accelerated pace.
- It wants to produce clothes with sustainable, biodegradable materials, reducing the big impact garments make on the environment when they are thrown away.
- Its garments are much higher quality, making the person wearing them more comfortable and not having to constantly buy new clothes because the other ones became unwearable.
- Promotes fair trade, without exploiting any workers and vendors in unfavorable positions, improving wealth creation and fighting poverty in the regions that produce fashion.
- It goes hand-in-hand with Slow Fashion and all the benefits it brings, like supporting small businesses, innovation and competitiveness. If you want to know more about Slow Fashion feel free to read out Slow Fashion 101.
This sustainable movement has a lot more pros that you should consider, and it overwhelms the few pros Fast Fashion may have. However, we just covered one of the most important ones, which can be enough to illustrate why this movement is so important.
biggest cons of sustainable fashion
We have seen the biggest pros, but to be fair we also have to look at some of the cons of this sustainable anti-fast fashion movement, which are not a lot but still are, at the end of the day. Having said this, these are the biggest cons of Sustainable Fashion:
- It is usually more expensive because it doesn’t outsource its costs to the environment and its workers, which is a fantastic thing, but it can be a drawback for some people, but considering it uses much higher-quality materials that last longer, it shouldn’t be a reason to not change one’s harmful fashion habits.
- The ecological movement can make brands greenwash their activities, portraying themselves as „green and sustainable” when none of those terms correspond to that brand. This sadly happens usually with Fast Fashion brands.
- This sustainable business model has not been around for a long time and its production is still inefficient, which makes the price higher and its success a little bit harder to achieve.
Overall, there are a few cons that we can mention, but these also have a considerable weight. However, don’t let them scare you one bit, because they can be surely corrected. Regarding the price, you should read our article on why Sustainable Fashion will be affordable.
pros vs cons of sustainable fashion
We have seen the pros, we have seen the cons, all of them have a considerable weight in themselves, while the cons as we said, can be corrected. Now, which is greater? The cons, or the pros? Well, that’s the question we will be trying to answer right now.
You may have seen that there are more pros on our list than cons, and that is because Sustainable Fashion, at the end of the day, is a fashion movement that wants to correct the terrible consequences that Fast Fashion has on our planet, it’s obvious that it is going to have a lot of pros because its main goal is to reduce the great environmental impact the fashion industry has right now, to save the planet, and by saving the planet we save our lives, what can be more important than that right?
Regarding the cons, the main disadvantage is its price, because it uses better, higher-quality and organic materials that have a much smaller impact on our planet, the price is usually going to be higher, and that is because it doesn’t outsource its costs to the planet and the people. This is a problem that can be resolved fairly easily, and that is something we have explained in our article Why Is Slow Fashion Expensive?
To sum it all up, the pros clearly overwhelm the cons, you may pay a little bit more for sustainable garments but the costs the entire planet saves in the future, and the costs you will save by not having to constantly buy new clothes, are much greater. And you don’t have to go all crazy into Sustainable Fashion, just by making a few small changes in your life you can make an enormous change long-term.
summary
We hope you have learned a lot today because so did we! Even if Sustainable Fashion may have its cons, it is absolutely nothing compared to how bad Fast Fashion is, and as we said, you don’t have to go all crazy with it, a few good deeds a day make a big change in the future, deeds like informing yourself and talking about it with your friends, spreading awareness because the single most effective way of stopping Fast Fashion is knowledge.
We are thrilled to teach people all around the world 🙂 Also, did you really know what Fast Fashion really is and its terrible consequences for the environment, the planet, the workers, society, and the economy? Do you know exactly what the Slow Fashion or Sustainable Fashion movement is? You should really take a look at these articles about this forgotten and unknown but very urgent and important subject, click here to read „Can Fashion Ever Be Sustainable?”, or Fast Fashion 101 | How It’s Destroying Our Planet because knowledge is one of the most powerful strengths you can have, while ignorance is your worst weakness.
We also have a big surprise for you! Because we want to give you the right to know us better, we have prepared a carefully dedicated About Us page where we will tell you who we are, what our mission is, what we do, a closer look at our team, and many more things! Do not miss this opportunity and click here to check it out. Also, we invite you to take a look at our Pinterest, where we will pin everyday sustainable fashion-related content, clothing designs, and other things that you will surely love!
