Going Green or Greenwashing? An analysis of fast fashion going sustainable

The matter of sustainability has come to the forefront of many peoples’ minds recently. As the effects we have on the environment become more prominent, we all want to do our part to slow them down. 

With sustainability in mind, many people avoid or have stopped shopping completely at clothing stores that don’t use sustainable production methods (me included). I actively try to avoid stores like Shein because of how unsustainable they are–I definitely don’t want my money supporting something like that. 

However, what happens when brands who are known to be unsustainable make the effort to be sustainable? Brands like H&M, Zara, and American Eagle have specific categories on their websites dedicated to clothing with more sustainable production compared to the rest of their items. Is this the brands taking responsibility for their effect on the environment? Or are they simply greenwashing to hop on the bandwagon?

WHAT IS GREENWASHING?

Greenwashing is the “practice of companies launching adverts, campaigns, products etc. under the pretense that they are environmentally beneficial, often in contradiction to their environmental and sustainability record in general”, according to Ethical Consumer. The term “greenwashing: has actually been used since the 1980s to call out brands that market themselves as environmentally friendly in order to make more sales. It wasn’t okay then, and it’s still not okay now–the status of our environment is something we have to take seriously, not use as a marketing tool.

With brands creating sustainable offshoots of their own, it’s important to look into the production methods of them and determine whether or not these brands are greenwashing or actually going green. The brands we’ll be looking into are: H&M Conscious, American Eagle Real Good jeans, Urban Outfitters Urban Renewal, Uniqlo BlueCycle denim, and Zara Join Life. 

H&M CONSCIOUS

According to H&M, their Conscious line contains at least 50% sustainable materials, mostly organic cotton and recycled polyester. They also develop sustainable materials to use in this line, like hemp biofibre and vegea (a leather made from grapes). They’ve developed an extensive line of clothing, with everything from basics to going out clothes. On their website, they have 1,364 items listed under their conscious choice section. That’s an insane amount of clothing to be sustainable, which begs the question, are they actually more sustainable?

In short, no, but they are trying (possibly). It seems their conscious line is genuinely making an attempt to be more sustainable. Their main marketing strategy is enticing people to buy the same amount of clothing, just buy sustainable clothing. This creates the same amount of waste, no matter if the clothing is sustainably made or not. The clothing they make in this line is a blend of fabrics–even though some of the fabric is more sustainably produced, the rest of the fabric will still take years to decompose when it’s inevitably sent to a landfill. In total, the brand really only uses 0.7% of recycled materials a year. This is clearly not enough to be considered actually sustainable. 

Their “conscious” efforts also include a recycling program in store, which has been proven to only recycle 35% of the clothes they receive. The rest of the clothing ends up in landfills instead of being recycled like they claim. Their marketing team knows that sustainable clothes sell more quickly than regular clothes, which is why they push the sustainable tagline so heavily for the Conscious brand. 

The answer: greenwashing

AMERICAN EAGLE REAL GOOD JEANS

American Eagle, known for their jeans, developed a new line of denim known as Real Good. According to their website, this line is part of their commitment to be carbon neutral by 2030 (though they haven’t disclosed what exactly they’re doing to get there nor do they mention any goals, which prevents us from measuring this commitment). Their Real Good jeans are made with sustainably sourced/recycled materials and use 14% less water (apparently saving 1 billion gallons a year) than typical jean production, which in turn reduces chemical contamination in water. They also claim that they’ve used the equivalent of 60 million plastic bottles in recycled polyester and almost 600,000 jeans have been donated for this initiative. 

This all sounds amazing, if American Eagle is truly focusing their efforts on becoming more sustainable. The problem is, we don’t actually know. American Eagle is incredibly private on their sustainability measures. There’s virtually no information on if this line of clothing truly is making a difference on their environmental impact or if these jeans are just as harmful. They don’t market as heavily as H&M does for their line, so that could be a sign that these aren’t greenwashing. From my perspective, I would say they’re sustainable? Or at least genuinely trying to be? But no clear answers could be found.

The answer: sustainable (?)

URBAN OUTFITTERS URBAN RENEWAL

The Urban Renewal line from Urban Outfitters recycles deadstock fabrics and reworks vintage items to create modern pieces with a story. Their website calls this clothing “upcycled, vintage pieces that are customized, reimagined, and remade”. Everything is one of a kind and is meant to be reminiscent of shopping at a thrift store, just without the searching. 

There’s a few issues with this line: 

1. They heavily market that everything is unique and one of a kind, which tells the consumers that they have to buy it now or they’ll never see it again.

2. They have new releases every week.

With these issues in mind, Urban is genuinely taking fabric that would otherwise be sent to a landfill to curate this clothing line. Despite the constant flow of new products, they’ve found a way to take materials/vintage items and rework them in a way that appeals to modern consumers. Also, Urban Outfitters doesn’t directly market this line as sustainable. They’ve framed it as vintage upcycling, and while we know this is inherently sustainable, it doesn’t seem as though they’re capitalizing on a green concept for the fashion line. 

The answer: sustainable

UNIQLO BLUECYCLE JEANS

Like American Eagle, Uniqlo has started their sustainability efforts through denim. In their BlueCycle Jeans line, Uniqlo has committed to reducing water waste in jean production by 99%. They use cutting edge lasers and ozone gas to distress their jeans instead of gallons of water previously used. They do this in house at a factory in Los Angeles, where they’ve developed this unique take on jean production.

How unique is this kind of production though? According to Fast Company, brands like Levi’s and Shein use the same technology in their jean production. Not only that, but they originally use pumice stones to distress their jeans, but now claim to use “eco stones” that reduce the amount of times the jeans have to be washed. They aren’t clear on what these eco stones are, nor are they clear on what they’re doing with the jeans besides reducing water. What about the fabric? Recycling anything besides water? Anything?

What they are clear on is that this brand is eco-friendly. It’s the first two words on their BlueCycle page. Scrolling through is them claiming how environmentally friendly they are and how this is the first step to saving the environment. This is literally trying to target consumers to say that buying their jeans will save the environment.

I think the answer is clear on this one.

The answer: greenwashing

ZARA JOIN LIFE INITIATIVE

Zara’s Join Life Initiative isn’t so much a brand as it is a project to create more sustainable materials. Their initiative, also known as Project Oca, works directly with Indian farmers to produce ecologically grown cotton with natural growth accelerators. These accelerators apparently reduce CO2 emissions and promote biodiversity on the farms. The cotton is then used in their clothing to help them become more sustainable. Clothing with the Join Life label typically has 50% recycled materials. It’s also made its way into 35% of their product line, according to Sustainability Mag. 

This initiative is amazing in terms of working with the Indian farmers. It shows that they’re taking making an effort to ethically source their materials, which is the first step towards sustainability. They’ve also made their goals clear to the public on how they want to be more sustainable going forward, including only using sustainable materials by 2023. 

However, just like with H&M, only 50% recycled materials isn’t enough to make clothes sustainable. And, while the production of the cotton is ethical, it doesn’t take away the use of resources and water that this kind of production needs. 

Is it the best option to be sustainable? Probably not, but you can tell that Zara isn’t just saying they’re eco-friendly–they’re truly taking the steps to get there. If they continue on the path they’re going, I believe their clothing will genuinely have more sustainable attributes than similar brands. 

The answer: sustainable

THE TAKEAWAY

Some fast fashion stores have genuinely taken the time to rework their brands into becoming more sustainable. Are some capitalizing on the sustainability trend? Absolutely. Are some actually trying to become more sustainable? The answer is yes, too. 

Obviously, we should all be choosing shopping methods like thrifting or purchasing clothes from someone else in order to minimize the amount of clothes going to landfills. However, sometimes we want to splurge on an item or get something that’s trendy, and that’s where these stores can come in. Something to note when shopping: these lines are sustainable, they’re just less damaging to the environment. Every one of these lines has some kind of environmental impact, even if it isn’t as negative as their counterparts. They aren’t the best way to be sustainable, but they’re a start.