Name: Is it the end of “Fast Fashion”? Topshop & Forever 21 are bankrupt ǀ Justine Leconte
Uploaded: 2021-04-22T09:29:38.000Z
Duration: 14 min 30 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Hi everyone, it's Justine. This year there has been a wave of fast fashion brands

going bankrupt. Forever21 in Europe, Topshop in the US...

big names that are suddenly in big trouble. So does it mean that the

so-called golden era of fast fashion is over? What are the options for you as a

consumer, as a shopper, wherever in the world you are? That's the discussion that

I would like to start in today's video. And before we do that, let me very

quickly define what fast fashion actually is, to make sure that we're

talking about the same thing because it's not a word commonly used everywhere

in the world what is fast fashion in a nutshell fast

fashion is a concept created for rich countries if we're honest a fast fashion

brand will have clothes produced in a less less rich country then production

was so cheap that they can afford to ship the clothes all the way to Europe

for instance where the living standard is and the costs are higher and then

they can sell these clothes in an expensive store somewhere in London

where the rent is expensive the salespeople are expensive everything is

more expensive so the business model works because the production costs in

the first place were insanely low it works because there are people buying in

rich countries and people producing in less rich countries it's a system based

on inequalities internationally and even then the margins for the fast fashion

brand are really low because the price tags are kept so low to attract

consumers even on a budget so if you're a fast fashion brand you will have to

sell incredibly high volumes in order to be profitable at all now if the

production costs start to increase for instance workers in Bangladesh get a law

that says that they have to be paid a living wage (it's not the case right now,

they work for a salary that they cannot live off of) let's assume their salary

increases (still not a high cost factor for the brand in the end, and we'll come

to that later) or the shoppers in said store in London are starting to demand

higher quality better ethics sustainable sourcing as a fast fashion brand you

will immediately lose your margin which is small and you will go bankrupt so

it's a very unstable system with very little buffer in case

something happens and something in the equation changes that it's just the

summary of how it works if you want to know more about how fast

fashion how the business model really functions from beginning to end I

recommend that you watch this video which I did previously

it's linked here and down below as well in there I explain among other things

the breakdown of the retail price of a t-shirt as an example how much the

government worker who saws it gets paid the retailer the transport the brand etc

if you new to that topic I have to warn you it might blow your minds but now

back to this video I want to move on to forever 21 which is the topic in the

title and it's absolutely a hundred percent a fast fashion label what

happened is that forever 21 failed at its own business model which is quite a

thing the American brand forever 21 filed for bankruptcy they are closing

about 350 stores worldwide out of 800 approximately they are practically

leaving Europe and Asia they are giving up their their remaining active in North

and South America but shrinking big time so it's really a setback for brand that

once was major they thing is the way they filed for bankruptcy doesn't mean

that they have to shut down the business it just means that they are freed of

their debts they don't have to pay the creditors so the supply chain people the

production people the suppliers won't get paid and if you know what I stand

for and what I talk about generally speaking on this channel you would know

what that makes me feel I'm mad when things like that happened I think it's

so unfair for the people who are before before that in the supply chain like

they always have the poor cards at the end of the day forever 21 was once known

for trendy fashion and very very low price tags

the problem is trends pass and once you've lost your cool competing on price

is not smart because it will never save you

if you're not cool people don't want to shop at your stores anymore

so forever21 is victim of the business model that they contributed to

establishing their brand was never really unique they lost the edge price

is irrelevant at the end of the day so they have to start over

does that mean that we're witnessing the beginning of the end of the first

fashion era unfortunately not quite yet Primark on the other side of the

Atlantic Ocean in Europe is still doing well

Primark is uk-based and currently leading the market for very very very

very cheap clothes directed mostly out of there a young target group teens

young adults dirt-cheap really we're talking about in British pounds 10

pounds for a pair jeans 250 for a bra 25 for coats if you think about it for a

minute you wonder how they even do it if you know the price levels in Europe it

seems so low that it's hard to be true I said cheap but I should say blood

cheap instead Primark is one of the brands that was having clothes produced

in the sadly famous Branagh Plaza building factory in Bangladesh that

building collapsed in 2013 killing over a thousand people and somehow Primark

and others got away with it Primark targets teens and young adults

how by relying heavily on the latest trends there's another UK former

flagship retail brand that's called Marks & Spencer where everybody in the

UK used to shop they didn't set enough on trends things Primark and they lost

their relevance because teens and young adults didn't want to shop well their

parents and grandparents were shopping so Primark is really trying to stay

relevant by going for the very very very young people and releasing new

collections all the time but now teens and young adults in Europe and

everywhere in the world are becoming more and more environmentally conscious

that's the greatest Wenberg effect and suddenly they're starting to research

and to question the way the fashion three works so a strategy question for

the future Primark how are you going to do in three years from now when your

exact target group is going to be a lot more aware and demanding in terms of the

clothes they're buying maybe they will turn towards more sustainable more

ethical brands and you will lose your relevance as well? Primark is aware of

the danger which is why recently they started the so-called sustainable line

which means that they source organic cotton what they don't tell you though

is that sustainable doesn't mean ethical it's a lot easier and a lot cheaper to

source sustainable materials for your production than to pay the government

workers properly and they say nothing about that it's completely untransparent

actually if you really want to do things right you need the sustainable sourcing

and you need fix in terms of how you do your production so it's really just a

marketing stunt meant to buy themselves an image of an ethical brand when really

it's actually one of the dirtiest players out there let me be really clear

about that and also this sustainable line is just a tiny part of their sort

and all the rest of what they sell all the basics is still sourced and produced

the way they used to do it and trust me it's not clean their sales keep

increasing yes they're doing fine for now but it's artificial growth it's