These days a Dutch TV Program presented a case on the brand SHEIN Fashion. The company who made a 2 bio dollar profit last year was profiled as; “The company where all the misery in the world comes together. Pollution, exploitation, stolen designs and toxic children’s clothing” SHEIN was described as a textbook example of how cheap does not come without a price.

The story was based upon a visit of some NGO journalists to a Dutch SHEIN shop. The journalists believe SHEIN to be the largest clothing webshop in the world. Twice as big as H&M. Their webshop has more than six hundred thousand items, and six thousand new items are added every day. Influencers are promoting it extensively, ‘because you can buy a lot for so little money’. And then being surprised during an unboxing when a 2 euro handbag turns out to be a crumpled piece of cloth in real life. Would they still promote it if they knew how much suffering is hidden behind a piece of clothing, the journalists wondered.

How to deal with Ultra Fast Fashion?
This question is perhaps even more relevant for followers with teenage kids: how do you deal with ultra fast fashion? “We stay far away from it the journalists claimed.” One of them pointed out. “And as long as you stay away from it and algorithms can’t find you, you won’t be bothered by it much. But the world of SHEIN is so big that every sustainable step in fashion seems pointless. And that is very frustrating, but we will persevere with our message: buy second-hand, buy more sustainably and buy much less! A German think tank has calculated that five items of clothing per year will remain within the carrying capacity of the earth. Pass this message on, especially to the children with clothing money”.