We have all been sucked in by those videos circulating online of “My $200 Shein Haul” or “Everything I bought for less than $5 from TEMU Review”, but who actually are the two new giants on the ultra fast fashion scene?
In a world where it seemed the general consensus had shifted towards more environmental and ethical consumption, how have these two brands established a global network reaching 150 countries worldwide, and what is at stake if they continue to grow unchecked?
Who Are Shein and Temu?
Starting with Shein, a China-based ‘ultra-fast fashion’ brand established in 2008 which has experienced astonishing growth since it first appeared. They sell everything from clothing to accessories, homeware and beauty and introduce a staggering 2,000-10,000 new items to their platform every day!
Shein manufactures ‘on demand’, initially producing small amounts of each design – if an item sells well (the demand is high) it stays, with a high turnover of failed designs. Brand leaders owe the success to sheer innovation, producing a huge amount of products incredibly quickly, and selling them to consumers at much lower prices compared to industry competitors – the average price of an item on Shein being just $9.84 (£7.90). The company constantly collects user data, allowing them to predict the future (aka possible trends) way before competitors do, giving them the second advantage of being ahead of the game.
So how is there space in the world for yet another destructive consumption giant?! Introducing Temu, arguably the most destructive driver of consumption ever created, is a Chinese based e-commerce company offering very cheap products, relying on heavy marketing and data collection. Established later in 2022, Temu offers a wide range of products across 250 categories, including home goods, electronics, and of course clothing.
However, the brands do differ in some ways. They operate a different business model, with Temu offering a platform for third party businesses to connect with consumers. Temu also helps merchants develop their products and share consumer insights they collected from the data to assist suppliers in creating successful and affordable products. This has proven rather successful, as 152 million Americans use the platform every month.
This may seem too good to be true – the latest trends before they’ve even trended yet, at extortionately low prices?! Well unfortunately the growth of these two platforms is most definitely NOT a good thing. The cost may not be coming directly from the consumer’s pocket, but it is coming from somewhere, in the way of environmental destruction, and at the extent of someone, in the way of pollution exposure, awful labour conditions and perpetual dissatisfaction (and potentially harmful exposure) for the consumer.
*Disclaimer – Although Temu sells other goods in addition to clothing, in this article we focus on their clothing sales and refer to them as an ultra fast fashion brand for their enormous contribution to destructive fast fashion practices.
How Are They So Cheap?
One of the distinctive characteristics that sets both Shein and Temu apart as ULTRA fast fashion brands is the astonishingly low prices they charge – but how do those prices get so low?
- Labour: One of the ways that all fast fashion brands (including these two) keep their prices so low is they usually manufacture/source from manufacturers that operate in countries with both low cost of living (meaning low minimum wages) and little regulation (meaning any efforts to protect workers is poorly enforced if at all). The general rule is if you are paying an unbelievably low price for a product, the person making it has been paid an unfair wage for their labour. Often this means involvement of forced, child or penal labour and workers are subjected to awful conditions and chemicals. US lawmakers have previously warned of an ‘extremely high risk’ that Temu and Shein were using forced labour – for Shein this would look like as part of their supply chain manufacturing and Temu for offering products on their e-commerce site.
- Materials: Another huge sacrifice Shein and Temu make in a bid to keep prices extremely low yet profits up is with the quality, in particular the materials they use. The low-quality materials used and assemblage of items with little attention to longevity means the products often deteriorate and/or break quickly. But this is good news for Shein and Temu! Throwaway culture is how these platforms thrive, as they rely on our constant need to consume. Moreover, this often ends up being the more costly option! In the long run, a dress made cheaply, poorly with low quality materials needs to be continually replaced – possibly three or four times. That bargain $15 dress soon adds up to be a costly endeavor, possibly more so than the sustainable option, and with all the other negative consequences. Find out more later on why the exposure to some of the chemicals used in their cheap materials could actually be affecting your health!
- Mode of production: Of course the low price they both offer must somewhat be attributed to their business model of choice. Although different, they both rely on high levels of consumption, to drive high levels of production, with a streamlined mode of production. This requirement for overconsumption is evident in marketing efforts on both brands’ platforms. Users are constantly bombarded with micro-advertisements on social media outlets such as Tiktok and Instagram, and even on their individual apps, there are offers, games and gambling opportunities to keep users addicted to buying.
What Are the REAL Costs?
As we alluded to earlier, it is not without some costs that these brands operate, it may just be in a way we do not instinctively recognize.
In just over a century humans have gone from owning a few, cherished, purposeful objects, that would be cared for and repaired to last a lifetime, to owning an abundance of valueless, disposable items, with the only return of a brief feeling of satisfaction when purchasing. Not only that, but the constant desire to fulfill this addiction is causing irreversible damage to the people that make it, the environment and also for you!
Environmental Costs
- Carbon Emissions: It is no secret that the fast fashion industry is one of the biggest contributors to carbon emissions, responsible for approximately 10% of all global emissions every year. Global supply chains, manufacturing of textiles, assembling of garments and transportation all add up towards a brands carbon footprint. Shein and Temu, more than ever, prioritize and even encourage throwaway culture (buy, throwing away, buying again) for profit. This process relies on an incredible amount of manufacturing, only continuously increasing carbon output. The brands are a catastrophe for the target of net-zero emissions by 2050 for the global fashion sector, as their rate of emissions only increases, threatening the progress and morale of the fashion industry towards a sustainable future.
- Toxic Chemicals and Pollution: Dying and treating textiles in the fashion industry is a huge contributor to water pollution globally, especially when regulation is poor/poorly enforced by authorities. This affects the quality of water for people locally and also for aquatic life. Furthermore, a recent investigation carried out by authorities in South Korea found carcinogenic substances (promoting the development of cancer) hundreds of times over the legal limit in Shein clothing. Similarly, a European investigation into toys, baby products, electronics and cosmetics sold on Temu that breach European regulation, with one toy tested containing phthalates 240 times above the legal limit. (Phthalates can affect the function of organs and long-term can affect pregnancy, child growth and development and affect reproductive systems in both children and adolescents).
- Excessive Demand for Raw Materials and Textile Waste: The world consumes approximately 80 billion new clothing items every year – that is A LOT of new clothes! Brands like Shein and Temu rely on this constant consumption to continue to make a profit, however there is only so much resource on Earth, and everything has to go somewhere. Estimates predict Shein alone produces nearly 200,000 new items each day. One of the ways countries have dealt with ultra fast fashion consumption is by shipping textiles overseas. Ghana receives 150,000 tonnes of used clothes dumped every year, with approximately half of these unusable. The clothing is commonly dumped and burnt, polluting local ecosystems with dangerous industrial chemicals, and damaging freshwater sources for local people. This exportation of textile waste is a new wave of ‘clothing colonization’, in which exponential consumption in the ‘Global North’ flows to the ‘Global South’.
Forced and Unethical Labour
We have already touched briefly on some of the failures with Shein and Temu in ensuring safe working conditions and fair wages for their workers. Shein outsources its clothing, subcontracting the manufacturing process to various third parties. Just last year Shein admitted to finding cases of child labour within their supply chain, as well as factories failing to pay minimum wage. Because Shein does not own any of the manufacturing facilities, it alleviates accountability for the brand to uphold ethical practices and also questions the transparency of what goes on in the factories. Similarly Temu operates as an e-commerce platform for manufacturers to sell, so does not own any of the factories manufacturing takes place in.
As we have discussed, a US government investigation found an “extremely high risk” that some of the products being sold on Temu involved forced labour. Similarly Shein has refused to comment on allegations from human rights groups that their supply chain involves forced labour, specifically coming from the Xinjiang province in China, in which human rights abuses have been committed by Beijing against members of the ethnic Uyghur group and other muslim minorities. The reluctance from leaders of the brands to answer simple questions on the use of forced labour in their supply chain has left policy makers with “zero confidence” in the integrity of such supply chains.
Design Theft
Shein and the goods sold on Temu are also notorious for their design theft from independent designers and small businesses. There have been multiple accounts of the two brands recreating original artwork and designs from artists at an unbelievably low price, undercutting the original product.
One victim even found Temu using her original photos to advertise their copied product! After contacting Shein and Temu over copyright infringement, the listings were removed, but not before 100s of copies were sold at the incredibly low price. She was also refused compensation for the profits the Chinese retailers made and was disheartened by the little power small businesses and independent designers have in fighting against the design theft committed by the brands.
Cultural Appropriation
Not only have the Chinese giants been robbing independent designers for profit, they have also been plagiarizing different cultures and religions. Shein recently came under fire online for religious and cultural appropriation. The brand was selling items labelled by Shein as “Greek fret carpets” and “floral trim carpets”, but were actually Islamic prayer mats. The rugs had designs and symbols common in prayer mats used in Islam. Shein was also selling sleepwear that imitated cultural clothing modeled by white models, using culture and religions as a ‘trend’ in exchange for profit, or something to rebrand and sell. This was not the first or last time that cultural clothing and/or designs have been copied, exploiting culture and religion for a profit.
Some of the Costs for the Consumer
- Exposure to Chemicals: We are beginning to understand more on how the harmful chemicals used in the manufacturing process as well as in the synthetic fibres used for these cheap materials are dangerous for the consumers health. Shein and Temu, as we have seen, are two culprits found to use dangerous chemicals/dangerously high levels of substances known to cause harm to human health when the user is exposed to it. Find out in detail about how toxic clothing could be threatening your health here.
- Climate Change: We live on one planet, a closed loop. So no matter where pollution is emitted- by air or into the ocean – it is going to affect us all in some way. Similarly, we will all suffer as a result of the negative consequences ultra fast fashion creates – biodiversity loss, carbon emissions, water pollution and excessive depletion of natural resources to name a few. Just because these processes are not happening on our doorstep does not mean we should not care. It is in fact our demand for this sort of manufacturing that is driving the destruction after all.
Buy Less, Care More
We are all told by advertising that if we just buy the next best thing we will be happy and it will solve all our problems. Until we do buy it and the satisfaction lasts as long as a $3 top from Temu (aka not very long).
‘You don’t need it, but you want it’ – ultra fast fashion companies ignite this ‘want’ within you (often without you even realizing) – your constant consumption is what makes them money. Shein and Temu have built empires by tricking us into this endless cycle of consumption. However, meaningless overconsumption is never the answer to one’s happiness.
Purposeful purchases in pieces of clothing that were curated with care, and with the intention to last a long time can bring so much joy, as well as looking after society and the environment. Less really can be more.
Here at Eco-Stylist, we believe in brands that prioritize ethics, sustainability and transparency over throwaway fashion. You can find out more about the list of brands we support by visiting our brand guide. There we have certified over 100 brands that are dedicated to the highest labour and environmental standards, all whilst operating with complete transparency throughout the supply chain.
Amy previously studied Environment and Development at the London School of Economics with a particular interest in climate injustice. Currently she works in the travel industry hoping to hear more of the unique perspectives held by people all over the world, and has taught herself how to crochet and sew her own clothes at home.
