#weekly selection
THE TWILIGHT OF THE ETHICAL CONSUMER
‘It might sound like we’re cut from the same cloth, but Consumer Activists of yesteryear share few similarities with our modern Ethical Consumer selves. While Consumer Activists went to great lengths to understand how products were made and sold and how corporations function, this process of knowing was not in service of choosing better products (à la the Pollan era of privatized enlightened consumption)—it was for the explicit purpose of holding corporations and government accountable. “Consumer reforms cannot be separated from corporate reforms: they are two sides of the same coin,” wrote Nader in The Consumer and Corporate Accountability, a 1973 anthology of the movement’s mid-career victories.‘
‘The most striking difference between yesterday’s consumer activist and today’s ethical consumer is the matter of responsibility. Who or what is to blame for social problems, and who has the power to solve them? Consumer Activists believed that companies selling goods and services have a responsibility to “their customers, to their workers, and to the government agencies which regulate them.” Companies have a responsibility to society. And when companies endanger us or the environment, it’s their fault, not ours as shoppers. They understood that the market must be tamed with democracy, and rules, and guardrails, or it would always exploit.
The Ethical Consumer, by contrast, somehow believes that we personally cause social problems by sending market cues that we want unethical and unsustainable products. If we follow our own beliefs to their logical conclusion, that means problems as serious as the climate crisis, racist inequality, union-busting, food deserts, and sweatshop wages are somehow the result of not shopping in the right stores. How convenient for the Fortune 500 companies that directly cause so many of these troubles.‘
Fashion Goes Green to Raise Capital
But: ‘ESG bonds and loans are only a starting point. Indicative of progress within the industry, many still fail to address pressing issues surrounding labour rights and environmental issues beyond their own operations.
“Within the social space, the real material issue is actual wages, and bonds are not going to magically solve those issues,” said Bédat. “Materiality means what is happening on your scope three emissions, materiality means what wages are your workers receiving, materiality means how many people of colour are on your board. That’s the way to move away from greenwashing or green aspirations and really fundamentally address and change how companies are operating.”’
‘Made in Bangladesh’ may soon mean your clothing is much more sustainable
‘Bangladesh is a prime spot for a mass-recycling experiment. It is ground zero for fast-fashion manufacturing thanks to its low-wage workforce. This means that a lot of cheap, low-quality clothes pass through its borders, leading to a lot of waste. (This cheap labor often comes at a high human cost: Many Bangladeshi workers face terrible working conditions; in 2013, the Rana Plaza garment factory collapsed, killing 1,134 workers.) Factories are full of clothes that were thrown out because of a manufacturing error and bolts of fabric that were ordered but never used—plus all the scraps leftover from regular production. COVID-19 has only exacerbated this problem. The pandemic has hit the fashion industry hard and many brands have cancelled orders. According to the Global Fashion Agenda, wasted fabrics and finishes are piling up at factories. The goal of the recycling project is to capture these and other waste materials, then transform them back into new clothes.’ ‘Still, sustainability experts warn that recycling is not going to save the planet if clothing consumption continues to increase, and fast-fashion brands continue churning out billions of clothes every year. In addition to recycling, consumers need to buy less and wear each item longer. And brands need to design and market clothes so they are more durable—which is diametrically opposed to how fast-fashion brands design today.’
For Brands, Is Resale Actually Worth It?
‘Every item for sale on a secondhand marketplace must be sorted, priced, photographed and described in a listing. Multi-brand resellers have giant warehouses where some of that work is automated. Few brands can hope to achieve the scale needed to do the same.
At Eileen Fisher, for example, all new items must have a price tag that also includes a bar code and information about the materials used, information that comes from various departments. Eileen Fisher Renew, the resale arm, has to figure out what older pieces are made of and set its own prices, said Cynthia Power, the secondhand division’s director.
“There are these [surprising] challenges, where when something feels like it should be easy actually isn’t at all,” Power said. “If you’ve built your company as a retail company, offering resale requires a different set of practices.”’
A few things/articles/posts/music/whatever I’ve read/seen/found/enjoyed during the week about to end.
Branding and marketing for the post-virus world
First, a question - “Who do you want to be during the pandemic?” asks Prof. Galloway?
Great report - as usual - from McKinsey: From surviving to thriving: Reimagining the post-COVID-19 return
Interesting article on BoF co-written by the legendary Mr. Kapferer: ‘6 Predictions for Luxury in a Post-Virus World’
Key takeaway: ‘What we are likely to see is the acceleration of existing trends.’
Another one from BoF: ’Resale market in times of coronavirus’
The main points: ‘People are now just spending money on clothes instead of going out.’ and ‘This crisis will completely change shopping behaviors, and when every dollar counts, resale will be far more attractive.’
And - another one from the mighty BoF: ‘Traditional PR Doesn’t Work Anymore. Here’s What Does.’
The takeaways: ‘The more truthful you are, the more you communicate, the more it resonates.’ and ‘The more personal your brand is, the more successful your brand is.’
Since we are talking about the current situation… ‘The Apocalyptic World of Daphne Guinness’ on PAPER magazine
‘The fashion icon, heiress and philanthropist, known for her avant-garde style and relationships with the world’s most important designers and creatives, is here to talk about David LaChapelle, her good friend and longtime collaborator, whom she worked with for a three-part video series featuring music from her upcoming album Revelations.’
Other
“Talent borrows, genius steals” - Instagram account of the week: @justinbernardez_ This kid replicates rappers’ songs in ONE MINUTE.
Tumblr of the week - Anstee
Watch Micheal Jordan’s best commercials on HS.
Record of the week (possibly of the month): Makaya McCraven, ‘Universal Beings’
From‘Artist Tom Sachs Has 7 Rules for Creative Living’ - ‘Rule 1: Output Before You Input “The first exercise of ISRU is first thing in the morning, before you look at your e-mail or Instagram or the newspaper or make a phone call or whatever: Write. Dance. Sing. Touch clay. Draw. Output before you input. I’m gonna give a shoutout to my homeboy Edward Tufte. He taught me this lesson and I employed it. So when you’re sleeping, you slept for, say, 8 hours. You’re spending 8 hours with your subconscious mind making sense of nonsense. Regular life’s crazy enough, and the surreal mind that the subconscious explores doesn’t make any sense, but it’s part of our brain trying to make sense of the things we can’t make sense of during the day. It’s very regenerative. That’s why we dream. It helps our mind reset. When you wake up in the morning you’ve got exclusive access to your dreams. That’s why people say write down your dreams. That’s a great exercise. If you don’t know what to do, definitely do that one first. You’re translating your subconscious mind, the crazy stuff, into your rational mind. Soon enough, your phone will ring. You’ll have an alert. Some fucked up thing will come into your frame of consciousness, you’ve got babies screaming…but if you steal those first five minutes, first hour, depending on how lucky you are or how busy you are—everyone can spare five minutes. Don’t watch another episode of fucking Ozark or whatever, some fun drug TV bullshit that you’re enjoying, it doesn’t bring you anything. The gold is in your subconscious ‘cause that’s who you are. That’s part of you that you don’t even know.’
Self service magazine’s latest issue is available for free on their website: https://selfservicemagazine.com/#/issue52/
Last but not least: see Gucci’s exhibition, ‘No Space, Just A Place’, in 360°: https://nospacejustaplace.gucci.com/en.html#360tour
A few things/articles/posts/music/whatever I’ve read/seen/found/enjoyed during the week about to end.
Music + Gaming
Travis Scott fusing live music and gaming, in order to create the ultimate psychedelic experience/trip - ‘Going Deep Down the Rabbit Hole of Travis Scott’s ‘Fortnite’ Show’, reports HIGHSNOBIETY.
Quarantine fashion campaigns
Jacquemus has been pushing the boundaries once again, showing he knows how to read the Zeitgeist and surf the latest Internet trends - ‘Bella Hadid stars in the first Facetime campaign for Jacquemus, titled “Jacquemus at Home” and shot by Pierre-Ange Carlotti from the safety of their respective lockdowns.’ (HIGHSNOBIETY)
BoF talked about it, as well - ‘Will Covid-19 Change Fashion Photography?’ ‘In the face of social distancing measures, photographers have embraced new modes of image-making on platforms like Zoom and FaceTime. But the long-term impact of the crisis could go even deeper.’
TikTok
BIG questions - here is another one: ‘How Can Brands Benefit From TikTok?’ (Gartner)
Gucci and CSR
Talking about campaigns influenced by the current times and mood, Gucci teamed up with the Almighty Sir David Attenborough and The Lions Share Fund - the result is #SoDeerToMe; watch it on Instagram and on G’s website.
Fendi - good and bad news
Since we are touching icons of Italian fashion, here is an interesting podcast feat. Tim Blanks and Silvia Venturini Fendi - ‘The BoF Podcast: Silvia Venturini Fendi Will Surprise You’.
It’s not just good news for Fendi, though - the brand is being sued, the The Fashion Law reports: Fendi is the Latest Fashion Brand to be Sued for Allegedly Failing to License its Photos‘
Rushkoff on Internet and intellect
Something for the sociology aficionados out there - ‘The Internet Used to Make Us Smarter. Now, Not So Much.’ argues Douglas Rushkoff. Key takeaway: ’The primary purpose of the internet had changed from supporting a knowledge economy to growing an attention economy. Instead of helping us leverage time to our intellectual advantage, the internet was converted to an “always on” medium, configured to the advantage of those who wanted to market to us or track our activities.’ LEGEND.
Art & ASMR
DAZED put together a list of ’12 digital art shows that you don’t need to leave the house for’; they also gave us this: ‘Listen to some soothing fashion ASMR courtesy of Marine Serre’.
Craig Green & The Uniform
Marine Serre ain’t the only one pushing for a green (dystopian) fashion: ‘CRAIG GREEN ON THE LOST ROMANTICISM OF UNIFORMS’. (END)
Fashion collaboration of the year?
Collaboration of the week (maybe month? Year? Decade?): ‘the 7-Eleven x Nike SB Dunk Low’. (HYPEBEAST)
Japanese cycling culture
Totally unrelated, yet rather interesting - ‘Keirin School: Inside the strict and secret world of bicycle racing in Japan’. (BBC)
Tumblr ain’t dead
Here is a Tumblr blog I discovered this week - ‘Rugged Never Smooth’.
Music is my radar
And here is the record I have been listening to the whole week, on repeat. The Fall Live at the Witch Trials - MEGA.
The End.
