A Case Against Thrift Shops.
An opportunity lost and a fashion revolution that may never happen.
Fashion is as important to me as is my dominant arm. I am not trained in Fashion, and to an extent I’m glad because I have my reservations when it comes to the institutionalisation of the fashion industry. I may be wrong but I do believe that a mere nobody like me has more to offer than Vogue whose spread has started to have an uncanny resemblance to an IKEA catalogue (meaning its all advertisements). So as a self proclaimed contrarian whose biggest fear is holding a point of view that is commonplace among her peers, I have something to say.
I see absolutely no sense in the proliferation of the thrift shop in our popular culture, and even though the concept is just picking up, I see no place for it in our future.
I remember watching, our funny (so I am told) desi boy, Hassan Minhaj’s episode on fast fashion, I wasn’t comfortable with a straight brown man injecting himself in a conversation about fashion. I guess I had an idea of desi virility that shattered that day. (Fashion belongs to us, the girls and the gays) Hassan touches upon the ecological and ethical impacts that fashion has on our planet and on us, mainly concentrating on Zara and H&M. I do not know if its my rotten skepticism or some valuable critique that found it odd that he concentrated on two non American brands – Zara is Spanish and H&M is Swedish. The fashion industry has bigger, richer and more influential conglomerates. In fact barring H&M, Zara and Uniqlo almost all other brands that contribute to fast fashion-esque problems such as Victoria’s Secret and Nike are American. The guilt is now outsourced successfully.
China and America combined consume more than half of the number of apparel units purchased per country. (39% and 16% respectively) Although China does do the most numbers in this sector if you factor in the populations of the two countries, Americans individually consume more. Precisely 23 items of clothing more. Americans buy 53 items of clothing per year, Chinese buy 30 and Indians buy 5.
On an average Indians consume 10 times lesser than an American. But by no means am I trying to insinuate that we should be taking up 10 times lesser responsibilities.
India is one of the most unequal countries in the world, and income inequality has been on a rise. It would take 941 years for a minimum wage worker in rural India to earn what the top paid executive at a leading Indian garment company earns in a year. According to chief procurement officers at leading apparel companies, Bangladesh, Vietnam and India are at the top of the list for sourcing markets in the near future. 41% of chief procurement officers expect to increase their sourcing share from India. If you compare the gini coefficient (a ratio that represents income inequality in a nation or select group) among these three countries India does the worst. When it comes to minimum wages it doesn’t look good either, Vietnam’s is higher and although Bangladesh has a lower minimum wage, India’s minimum wage systems are way more complex because the wages vary from state to state and also vary based on skill and in many cases also vary based on gender.
Another way in which India differs from America is when it comes to formal and informal retail. Formal retail accounts for only 35% of sales. The unorganised or informal markets, where most of the consumption is taking place consists of private commercial enterprises not registered with the government, which typically consists of self employed individuals. By that definition thrift shops are just gentrified informal markets, and what about gentrification is really ethical ?
In my opinion thrift shops are performative. Its performative because all of this takes place on Instagram and not on Depop, a pre-existing platform that does exactly what these thrift shops aim to do. Instagram is a platform that one could associate with gaining social clout, which there is no harm in doing by the methods of selfies and plates of avocado toast (if that’s still a thing). One could argue about the ease that comes with Instagram (with the traffic it gets and also the transference to Facebook if needed) but I’m sure ethically speaking Depop is superior to Instagram (an assumption based on the fact that Depop is owned by a smaller tech company.)
I don’t think of abolishing thrift stores but my polemic lies in the fact that our solutions should be tailored to our ground realities. Im sure Instagram thrift store owners are well meaning individuals. But this is the insertion of the aspirational upper middle class into a scenario that could have done without them.
Conglomerates like LVMH, Kering, Inditex and L brands own enough brands to manifest anything they want into being the biggest trends of the season (especially the former two). India has the abundance of raw materials (cotton, wool, silk, jute), factories and skilled labour (that are most of the times not owned by fashion companies but work on a contract basis because of easy accountability dodging), very valid history of uncountable local and indigenous fashion practices and no shortage of young college graduate aged citizens. I refuse to indulge in a premature shrinkage in the field of fashion in India.
As a girl from Bombay it is very difficult to admit to the fact that Delhi is the fashion capital if the country had one. Todays Indian fashion scene is still aspirational (barring the Indian wedding fashion industry). Nobody is looking towards Delhi for trailblazing fashion inspiration.
Disclaimer : I do not mean to promote consumption, I hope that comes across with my writing. I also don’t want this to be mistaken as inciting some strain of nationalism, I would say the same for other countries like Bangladesh, Vietnam, Myanmar and also for the African countries fashion brands from the west want to invest in.
