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Fast fashion: a second special issue
Edited by Liz Barnes and Gaynor Lea-Greenwood
1. Introduction
Fast fashion has become the most well-recognized business model in the fashion industry due to its impressive performance in the global market during recent years. Since the Industrial Revolution in the eighteenth century, numerous inventions and innovations have shaped the development of the fashion industry within a complex system and scope. Fast fashion brands such as ZARA and H&M are among those at the very peak of this development through their supply chain management, merchandising techniques, and retail technology, which encompass almost every aspect of the fashion business. Based on these competitive advantages, fast fashion brands have achieved steep growth in most continents. For example, Inditex (the mother company of the famous ZARA), which opened its first store in a small town in Spain in 1975, is now present in 77 countries, with 5,044 stores that boasted annual sales of 12,527 million euros in 2010 ([15] Inditex Group, 2011).
Consumption was praised as the engine of the capitalistic economy throughout the twentieth century. Materialistic values are so widely dispersed that many believe that the more consumables one possesses, the better one's life is ([7] Chaplin and John, 2007). An emphasis on speed, quantity, and size drives the consumption culture and industries, to the point where they have inevitably begun to encounter problems; these problems are often threats to human well-being. Examples include environmental problems such as global warming, ozone depletion, water and air pollution, species endangerment, and farmland erosion. In addition, ethical issues in the globalized economy, such as fair trade, child labor and sweatshop problems, and social inequality, have become concerns to ordinary people. Specifically, some consumers who have realized their roles in consumption and its corresponding effects on society have begun to organize and participate in social movements relating to anti-consumption, including voluntary simplicity and downshifting, and "green" consumption movements ([36] Zavestoski, 2002).
Fashion epitomizes materialistic consumption. It serves as an efficient tool for showing off the wearer's wealth and status in terms of material possessions. Consumers often consider fashion products to be connected with their identity, as items of clothing are always visible and serve as a form of "second skin." Industry experts and researchers have traditionally...