Fast Fashion: The downfall of the integrity of shopping.
Before online shopping the quickest thing we had was catalogues. You called a number with your clothing choices and read off your credit card information. Then in about a month your clothing pieces would arrive, with the hefty shipping costs. As we have moved into the digital era buying clothing online is much more accessible, hundreds of thousands of websites exist. We can basically take a trip around a huge shopping mall while sitting on our couch.
This method of fast fashion shopping has been around for a while, but what has really changed is the introduction of social media. Apps like instagram and tiktok have aggressively sped up the trend cycle on its own. A person sees an beautiful house of CB dress on their favorite celebrity on tiktok and can quickly head to amazon to find a cheaply made dupe. At many points a video a few swipes after will have a direct link to the cheap dupe. Or there will even be an ad for a fast fashion brand using stolen images from the brand.
All of these fashion trends are being created because of social media. And we are seeing how long people are glued to their phones for the next new fashion trend, rather than using magazines or looking to the fashion houses. These fashion houses have even begun to cater to older crowds because trying to compete with the world of duplicates feels impossible.
One thing that has especially changed the fashion industry’s reaction to social media creating fashion trends is the creation of tiktok shop. While trying to simply swipe and enjoy funny or entertaining videos, just about every 4th video is an advertisement for a tiktok shop product. And while these items range from chamoy pickle kits to tents, clothing is a huge market. Many items are marketed as “vintage” while being extremely mass produced with multiple brands selling said item.
The clothing items are immediately very appealing, we see the clothing item in action styled well in what we perceive as a person just like us. It’s even better as most times you look at an item it has a “temporary flash sale” which is usually actually occurring all the time. But as consumers by seeing the item styled and for a low price we are immediately sucked in, like moths to a flame.
What’s even better is the ease, if you have already entered in your address it takes a few clicks and not even leaving the app to make a purchase. Sometimes the clothing is even available through a live stream, and the phenomenon of getting it before it’s gone is even more present.
The crux of this is that we are going through a crisis, young people are only really buying their clothes through social media. We’re seeing this rise of extremely popular clothing and brief trend cycles. About a month after something becomes a global phenomenon on social media it’s seen as overdone and outdated. So we as young people need to take our steps away from social media and view fashion through archival materials. We need to find these timeless pieces and appreciate fashion for the art form it truly is.
XOXO, The Fashion Stock Market
