Slashdot Mirror
'No One Wants Your Used Clothes Anymore' (bloomberg.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: For decades, the donation bin has offered consumers in rich countries a guilt-free way to unload their old clothing. In a virtuous and profitable cycle, a global network of traders would collect these garments, grade them, and transport them around the world to be recycled, worn again, or turned into rags and stuffing. Now that cycle is breaking down. Fashion trends are accelerating, new clothes are becoming as cheap as used ones, and poor countries are turning their backs on the secondhand trade. Without significant changes in the way that clothes are made and marketed, this could add up to an environmental disaster in the making. [...] The tide of secondhand clothes keeps growing even as the markets to reuse them are disappearing. From an environmental standpoint, that's a big problem. Already, the textile industry accounts for more greenhouse-gas emissions than all international flights and maritime shipping combined; as recycling markets break down, its contribution could soar. The good news is that nobody has a bigger incentive to address this problem than the industry itself.
So you're saying we could cut out a major source of greenhouse-gas emissions by just going naked all the time?
North Korea has made a credible threat to drop Disco on the USA.
Maybe Monsanto or somebody else can simply engineer a bacteria that eats old clothes . . . ?
Now, it might be tricky deciding what exactly is old, but the results are guaranteed to be a hilariously hit at parties.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
People have cooties. Keep their clothes away from me.
Hold on to your out of date clothing. They will be back in style in 10 years. This is why I don't buy name brand clothing. It doesn't have any more quality and hearing people say "cool jacket" is only nice for so long.
So you're saying we could eliminate a major source of greenhouse-gas emissions by just going naked all time?
I can't believe there are not plenty of poor areas of the world that are more concerned with meeting human needs rather than catering to fashion taste.
That's because most female and male Americans have NO skills in altering clothes to fit them, let alone make something new.
Poor people don't care about fashion over freezing to death.
New clothes are not as cheap as used as used often goes for free if you use that donation box.
The Salvation Army is going strong in my town and all across the state.
This article has some sort of bullshit agenda.
The amount of Thrift stores around me has drastically increased in the past decade. My wife lived in Rome for years, and there's daily street fairs where there's many many used clothes being traded.
The article references used FIBERS, totally different from clothes. I see no evidence that thrift, or open air market prices are anywhere near the prices of new clothes. Used fibers turned into new clothes/goods are a different matter. I suspect the fibers will be used for something even cheaper. Insulation?
new clothes are becoming as cheap as used ones
Here in the U.S. "fashion retail" will sell a shirt for ~$50, while the very same shirt will show up a few months later at a thrift shop for ~$4. Some of the "upmarket" clothiers sell shirts (marginally nicer than the retail variety) for $100+ per shirt. At the local mall, I don't think you can even buy a T-shirt for less than $20 anymore. And they wonder why the place is so empty...
So wouldn't making the recyclers more efficient reduce their costs as well? I suppose they're missing
Or would efficiency overcome the raw material source?
Isn't textile one of the most recyclable materials in existence?
Even if the old clothes need to be shredded into fibers and re-spun, the recycled material doesn't have to be suitable as dress whites, it can be tent canvas, insulation, upholstery stuffing, etc.
What am I supposed to do with all my old leisure suits? Some of those fabrics could survive a direct nuclear strike.
First law of people: People are generally stupid.
Yes, they're capitalists in disguise. So what, it's a *relatively* green way of getting rid of stuff.
Why is this on Slashdot?
#DeleteFacebook
I just wear my clothes until they break down naturally and are shed in the next molting cycle.
Account -> Discussions -> Disable Sigs
Ugh.
Have you seen the average American?
Hijab and burka, for the sake of my lunch.
Or serape or mu-mu or tarp or circus tent. Take your pick.
When I wear your granddad's clothes I look incredible. Now what do I do?
There are also economists who are complaining that we are not recycling old clothes as much as we should.
Who is right?
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
I volunteer at a local food pantry that also makes donated clothes available to its clients. I generally only volunteer once a week, but I see a lot of people lining up to get clothing...whether it's for themselves or someone else.
Maybe other countries don't need/want our used clothing as much, but there's still a demand/need in the USA at least.
Give a hand, not a hand-out.
Yes, but did Bitcoin go up or down today?
Somehow, I'm betting most of us here are not subject to this problem.
Your average Slashdot user probably isn't what you'd call "fashion forward". :-P
What does global warming have to do with anything?
Where do all those non-sequitors come from suddenly? /. used to be a place where you'd get mostly on-topic discussions, interrupted only by the goatse-guy, the one with the app apps and the moo-cow. Hell, even APK is most of the time on topic.
But for some freakish reason in the past year or two we had an influx of people who keep droning on with their bullshit agenda. Whatever it may be this time. For fuck's sake, get back to Reddit and Twitter.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Fashion trends are accelerating, new clothes are becoming as cheap as used ones, and poor countries are turning their backs on the secondhand trade.
This is fantastic news. If a country is in a position to turn up their collective noses at perfectly serviceable used clothing because it's not new/trendy enough, I think we can take that as an official declaration that they're in fine shape to fend for themselves all the way around.
Donated clothes destroyed the domestic textiles industry in some countries and made people dependent on a constant supply of clothes from the West which were actually made in Southeast Asia
When I read the original article, I get the idea that a lot of it is based on this one disaster relief blanket maker's tale of woe, discovering that they were booted out as the preferred provider of their recycled blankets made from worn out clothing material. I can't help but wonder if there's more to their story than what they reveal here, since they stated the Chinese product being purchased instead is still 50 cents per blanket more expensive than what they were selling. Don't these things generally get contracted out to the lowest bidder?
Maybe their recycled blankets weren't as durable as the new Chinese ones? Or maybe they weren't as warm or comfortable?
Additionally, I agree with another Slashdot poster who found it rather hard to believe that all over the entire world, we've actually reached a point where concerns about fashion trump any interest or need for cheap, used clothing? Here in America, I find that at least in my circle of friends (including the people I communicate with via social media), few of us are fashion conscious at all. I have a couple of female friends who are, but more of them actually tell me they just want clothing that lasts. They hate spending large amounts of time picking out clothes that fit well and look good on them, only to have their favorite selections wear out and need replacing again after a year or two. The guys I know pretty much all just have a need for "business casual" clothing plus comfortable, casual wear for weekends and days off work. It's all about buying what's reasonably priced while fitting the category they're seeking. "Fast fashion" has no role to play there.
Because Everytime at the local thrift stores was too ratty to wear. Part of that is cloths are made more cheaply now (thanks fast fashion) and part of that is the thrift stores eBay all the really nice stuff. I suspect if your poor that's got to suck. When I was a broke ass college kid I could get something ok for a job interview for $20 bucks. Nowadays that stuff is on eBay for $100 or more...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
The used clothing market used to be different. A collector in the United States would first sort by quality. Clean, no stains, no rips clothing would be separated for shipment to markets, almost always international. There was no market otherwise. Rejected clothes would go to US rag manufacturers. But before shipment of the good items, they would be sorted a second time by designer label, because shops in foreign countries, such as Senegal, specialized by designer. And the markets were not only poor countries. The largest market for American used clothing was once Japan, because kids wanted to make a fashion statement. And it was a very complex market even there. When grunge rock became popular worldwide, the market for used American flannel shirts in Japan shot up, with much higher prices both there and here for the American collectors who knew what they were doing. We need a return for those good old days when buying and wearing obviously used clothing was a sign of cultural equality and virtue ("His clothes are dirty but his hands are clean. And he's the best thing that you've ever seen.").
What does global warming have to do with anything?
It's affecting the natural fiber crops, like cotton. If I didn't wear them until they were holey, the third world would be happy to have my castoffs because they are overwhelmingly made of natural fibers. I'm happy wearing secondhand clothing, but that's difficult for me because I'm two meters tall and there's not that much of it available to me compared to what's out there for others. Still, almost everything I own is made out of cotton, rayon, linen, or silk. I have a few poly blend overgarments, but I prefer to keep that stuff away from my skin.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Well, since the textile industry is a huge greenhouse-gas emitter already, and since they're just going to raise those emissions to meet the apparent increase in demand for new textiles, it seems they should just get taxed, right? I mean, slapping on a new textile tax will help decrease demand by denizens of the developing world by raising prices for new textiles out of their reach, thereby increasing demand for second-hand textiles again. Tax revenues could also be used to develop cleaner energy sources and mitigation techniques for greenhouse-gas emissions. It's a giant win, right?
Unless, of course, you happen to be one of those denizens... I'm sure that the prospect of helping the environment will fill them with warm fuzzies, though, even if they don't end up with particularly warm fuzzies to wear.
"Is not a sentence" is not a sentence. Well damn.
How does this not surprise me
pls stop destroying this place
Says the AC with no sense of irony.
In 1900 a man could build a serious canoe or row boat with paper. Today that is unwise. But back then they had paper that resembled our dollar bill. If was fabric and paper in sheets that they called paper. So they would build their boats and cover them with some sort of pain or varnish to lessen contact with water ans use those boats even on very long trips. so not so many people are building canoes these days but this type of product could be pressed into a board like product used to build or make patios and the like. Keep in mind that back then they had limited ways to seal their creations whereas we have coatings that are sturdy and long lasting. Paper pulp and fabric pressed with a mix of Elmers carpenters glue would have great strength an be quite useful.
I do. I want your old clothes. If they're in my size and not stained or worn-out. My wardrobe is mostly clothes that people got rid of that I think are cool. Why should I look like a clone with the latest fashions? Clones are boring.
In the book Brave New World the hypnotically-implanted mottos included "ending is better than mending" and "the more stitches, the less riches."
Between driverless cars delivering me pizza, and the internet, and meeting avatars, I really don't need to dress and leave the house.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Clothes burn great! Problem solved.
Spun sugar fibers could be woven into clothing. seriously. And everything eats sugar. Washing it might be a problem. But why wash? just make a new set on your 3D replicator every morning while you shower. Your smart mirror will gather your daily measurements for a sharp tailored fit.
If that's not enough for you, try imagining seven-of-nine is an edible skin tight body suit.
We donate a lot of clothes and other items all year.
We have been deducting donations, but even with the deduction cap being much higher next year and likely not itemizing, it's not like we'd stop doing that. The stuff has to go out and it's way easier and better for all to throw boxes of random but still useful stuff at Goodwill rather than in the trash, what a waste...
Also we never deducted full value, I don't think you can do that. I forget what the guidelines were but I'd say it's more like 10% of what we paid for it we used as the donated value - if that.
Lastly even though we are well off we still shop at goodwill ourselves. Some older clothes are better than modern, and you never know what other interesting stuff they may have. I have noticed in recent years the quality of electronics at Goodwill has gone way down, I think more people are selling anything half-decent on eBay now...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
"Thrift Shop"
(feat. Wanz)
Hey, Macklemore! Can we go thrift shopping?
What, what, what, what... [8x]
Bada, bada, badadada [8x]
I'm gonna pop some tags
Only got twenty dollars in my pocket
I - I - I'm hunting, looking for a come-up
This is fucking awesome
Nah, walk up to the club like, "What up? I got a big cock!"
I'm so pumped about some shit from the thrift shop
Ice on the fringe, it's so damn frosty
That people like, "Damn! That's a cold ass honkey."
Rollin' in, hella deep, headin' to the mezzanine,
Dressed in all pink, 'cept my gator shoes, those are green
Draped in a leopard mink, girls standin' next to me
Probably shoulda washed this, smells like R. Kelly's sheets
Piiisssssss
But--shit--it was ninety-nine cents! Bag it
Coppin' it, washin' it, 'bout to go and get some compliments
Passin' up on those moccasins someone else's been walkin' in
Bummy and grungy, fuck it, man
I am stuntin' and flossin' and
Savin' my money and I'm hella happy that's a bargain, bitch
I'm a take your grandpa's style, I'm a take your grandpa's style,
No, for real. Ask your grandpa. Can I have his hand-me-downs? Thank you
Velour jumpsuit and some house slippers
Dookie brown leather jacket that I found diggin'
They had a broken keyboard, I bought a broken keyboard
I bought a skeet blanket, then I bought a kneeboard
Hello, hello, my ace man, my Mello
John Wayne ain't got nothing on my fringe game, hell no
I could take some Pro Wings, make them cool, sell those
The sneaker heads would be like "Aw, he got the Velcros"
[2x]
I'm gonna pop some tags
Only got twenty dollars in my pocket
I - I - I'm hunting, looking for a come-up
This is fucking awesome
What you know about rockin' a wolf on your noggin?
What you knowin' about wearin' a fur fox skin?
I'm digging, I'm digging, I'm searching right through that luggage
One man's trash, that's another man's come-up
Thank your granddad for donating that plaid button-up shirt
'Cause right now I'm up in her skirt
I'm at the Goodwill, you can find me in the Uptons
I'm not, I'm not stuck, I'm searchin' in that section Uptons
Your grammy, your aunty, your momma, your mammy
I'll take those flannel zebra jammies, second-hand, I rock that motherfucker
The built-in onesie with the socks on that motherfucker
I hit the party and they stop in that motherfucker
They be like, "Oh, that Gucci. That's hella tight."
I'm like, "Yo, that's fifty dollars for a T-shirt."
Limited edition, let's do some simple addition
Fifty dollars for a T-shirt - that's just some ignorant bitch. Shit
I call that getting swindled and pimped. Shit
I call that getting tricked by a business
That shirt's hella dough
And having the same one as six other people in this club is a hella don't
Peep game, come take a look through my telescope
Tryna get girls from a brand and you hella won't
Man you hella won't
Goodwill... poppin' tags... yeah!
I'm gonna pop some tags
Only got twenty dollars in my pocket
I - I - I'm hunting, looking for a come-up
This is fucking awesome
I wear your granddad's clothes
I look incredible
I'm in this big ass coat
From that thrift shop down the road
I wear your granddad's clothes, damn right
I look incredible, now come on, man
I'm in this big ass coat, big ass coat
From that thrift shop down the road. Let's go
I'm gonna pop some tags
Only got twenty dollars in my pocket
I - I - I'm hunting, looking for a come-up
This is fucking awesome
Is that your grandma's coat?
Most of the clothes I buy are 100% cotton. Can't you just shred cotton, wool, linen, silk, rayon, etc. clothes and scatter the bits into the wind? They're natural fibers. That's what would've happened to the material anyway if they hadn't been turned into a textile. These things have been growing and dying for millions of years, and we're not buried up to our ears in them. So I assume bacteria are able to decompose them and re-enter the natural food cycles.
So what is this big incentive for the industry? They do not care that second hand are thrown away instead of used again. They even would welcome it. "Pleasy buy my stuff and throw it away without wearing it." "Please use it as a fule source." All things they would be totally ok with, as long as you give them monies.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
You could also wear them longer. It astounds me that people throw out perfectly good stuff. But I don't mind since I pick it up. I buy used cloths. A lot of people I know buy used cloths. The cost is about $1 typically, that's for a jacket, a shirt, pants, shoes, etc. Many people shop at thrift stores. These cloths are perfectly good. The new market isn't going to drop that low so there is going to be a market. So someone does want your used cloths. BTW, I'm in a third world country: Vermont (USA). :)
Still have a CRT? Might have to hazwaste it rather than e-waste. Likewise all those old computers that will be entering the waste stream after the Meltdown/Spectre stuff renders them unusable.
As for the clothes, I do remember the "rag bag" as a kid - everybody had one, and periodically dropped it off for recycling. Can't even find a place to take the clothes any more - Goodwill won't take old clothes unless they are very gently used and immediately resellable as clothes, not rags.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Could've fooled me. Street near me has about six charity shops. People drop in clothes all the time, they sell them, and the money goes to various causes. So uh, this article is bollocks.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
He makes some great points: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
The problem is that cheap new clothes are generally really poor quality. I have bought used clothes that were high-quality and last much longer than new ones would, for about the same price. The problem is there's a lot of garbage clothing to sift through to find the good stuff, but I enjoy that sort of treasure hunt.
Of course, the fashion industry doesn't want people to keep clothes for a long time. I'd say that's the real culprit.
Like washing down tide pods with an old pair of undies
When does this happen in the movie?
As the saying goes, it's the economy stupid. Growth of the poor and rich. Shrinkage of the middle class.
This site is nothing more than blatant left wing activism. This article belongs on slate.com, not slashdot.
Sorry - this echo chamber is devoid of purpose. This editor has made it much worse. msmash should be fired.
from a 2013 book, https://www.amazon.com/Overdre...
“Overdressed does for T-shirts and leggings what Fast Food Nation did for burgers and fries.” —Katha Pollitt
Author got idea when returning from one of those stores like Ross with bundle of "good deals" then realizing she will never wear these and has a closet stuffed with cheap clothes she will never wear. She also found (and this was years ago) almost all donated clothing will be sent to the landfill because it is cheaper to buy new stuff than used. Unlike years ago when clothing was quality made so it can be sold used or as hand-me-downs (which younger brothers and sisters hated).
But in the long run cheap fashion is high cost. Outfit that doesn't look that great, doesn't fit that well, and money wasted.
mfwright@batnet.com
I have a bluejean shirt with a big, fuzzy hole in the right sleeve, and it looks faded and almost threadbare in a few areas. I bought it new a couple years ago. Today, I can go to Gap and buy the same shirt, including holes and fading, for $40-50. Ditto for my bluejeans. So, how could those who receive a pair of new bluejeans, or shirt, from Gap tell them apart from mine, which are a couple years old?
I've seen guys climbing out of luxury autos wearing the same clothes that the homeless living at the shelter are wearing. So, how can one tell the difference if the auto isn't a reference point? The homeless need a haircut, shave and a bath? Nope. Coke noses? Nope. Alcoholic stupor? Nope. Flashing wads of cash or displaying a pack of credit cards? Perhaps. Hard to tell, but like porn, you'll know it when you see it.
Not long ago I discovered that a few marine transport ships are enough to eclipse all of the emissions from vehicles in North America. Now you tell me that the textiles industry creates significantly more than that. North American and European cars are already far cleaner than those in the rest of the word, mostly thanks to electronic fuel injection and other forms of increased efficiency which we are all happy to have anyway. Then there are termite farts which to my knowledge far eclipse all of those things. So what exactly is the argument for focusing on reducingthe environmental impact of cars on this continent? Most of the low-hanging fruit was snapped up in the 70s and early 80s, so it really does feel like we are scrounging for peanuts.
The only argument I can see that isn't purely political is that those other types of pollution are difficult or impossible to control whereas domestic transport sort of isn't.
I have not bought new clothing since I started sewing in 1995.
Not only does it last longer, it is also a pride of creation.
If you want to see pictures of my home made clothing, you can go to www.allyn.com
Most Respectfully Yours Mark Allyn Bellingham, Washington
Biodiesel from old cloth.
The biggest "thrift store" near me has some really expensive crap. They try to sell 10-year-old couches in great visual condition but with hideous colors for $250 with a brand new furniture store right across the street. I think DVDs are a few dollars a pop. Furniture and electronics are both insanely priced. Prices are non-negotiable. It amazes me that anyone bothers with the place. The only thing appropriately priced is VHS tapes. It doesn't matter how many used clothes you donate if they end up being priced as if they were new at the "thrift store." It doubly kills me because they get the damned stuff 100% for free. Lots of people are annoyed at how the place is being run.
But for some freakish reason in the past year or two we had an influx of people who keep droning on with their bullshit agenda. >
Honestly, I miss Dr Bob and his subluxations. I think grub was the last sophisticated troll I've seen on the internet.
I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
"an anonymous reader submits"
thats questionable to even start with!
"Fashion trends are accelerating"
maybe at the tip of them but a pair of jeans and a plain shirt hasnt really changed all that much in the past 30 years.
finally there is this:
"new clothes are becoming as cheap as used ones" and "The tide of secondhand clothes keeps growing even as the markets to reuse them are disappearing"
which violates the supply and demand ideas of economics, which coming from a bloomberg article is indicative of a propaganda piece. if the supply of second hand wares increases and the demand doesn't , then the price should be dropping to suit. Even if you consider that new clothes are cheaper to make then the price of second hand clothes should drop even more. So which is it? is supply and demand wrong or is the article BS.
Like other people have commented, the demand for second hand clothing has not diminished as thrift stores are still a prominent place to shop (i get almost all of my clothes second hand or from overstock sales) and the article is a bullshit piece that refuses to take a look at the bigger picture. It instead focuses on a few locations in India that used to take a lot of used clothes who now aren't. my personal opinion is that the fashion market has reached saturation and can no longer continue to expand which explains why at the bottom of the article you get the sentence: "To satiate the hunger for fast fashion, meanwhile, brands might also explore subscription-based fashion rental businesses" because the industry as it stands can no longer sustain itself on one time purchases they must now charge you a subscription.
I enjoyed giving my old clothes to the poor. After pissing in them of course.
The poor are being flooded with cheap or free clothes-- which do not spoil-- so they may not be naked while they starve... but it does more harm in that the local economy suffers because a whole industry dies when you provide it free or below cost of production.
Also, see the documentary "True Cost"
captcha: encroach
The article title is "No One Wants Your Used Clothes Anymore" however, the article provides no evidence to back-up that headline. Instead, it cites a single company that recycled fabric into blankets for disaster relief. So a more accurate headline would be "This One Company Doesn't Want Your Used Clothes Anymore." Recycling has never been about making things cheaper, it is about minimizing our environmental footprint. As many posters have commented, thrift stores are booming and donation boxes are popping up everywhere. The article also claims that "Fashion trends are accelerating, new clothes are becoming as cheap as used ones" but provides no evidence at all of clothing prices going down.
Women naturally have a keen awareness to how their appearance benefits them. How others see them influences how others treat them, so there is absolutely real practical value to ensuring that they do well on this front.
That means having clothing that is well-designed with good color blends and so on. It also means changing up often, to ensure that they can continue to get attention (and this is NOT frivolous...when the amount of social attention that women get starts to wane so can their success in romance and business).
Talking about this sort of thing gets resistance, which is why I am trying to frame it properly: women are doing what makes sense, given the response they get when doing this.
And, in this case, "what makes sense" includes regular investment in new-and-nice clothing.
This has not been my experience here in Thailand. When I have used clothes to give away the recipients are extremely grateful and not at all difficult to find. Perhaps it's not a good business anymore, but there are plenty of people who need whatever you can give.
I'm lucky enough to have a chain of thrift stores where I live that provides quality product. All the clothes have been cleaned and the junk never makes it to the racks. They also display by sizes. I bought my entire work wardrobe there at a fraction of the cost of new with a much higher quality of items. The older stuff seems to be better made out of better materials. And by buying used I know the exact size and color it's going to be in the future.
I don't really care about fashion. I don't care if teal is 'out' this year. I want quality clothing that fits me and doesn't break the bank.
I could pay $60 for a pair of dress slacks and hope they don't shrink or fade in the wash or I could spend $5 for a used pair that fit in the color I know they'll stay.
I donate to them as well as long as it's in the same condition as I would purchase it in. Otherwise it goes in the trash (after removing buttons and zippers of course) if I can't use it for cleaning rags due to fabric content.
If this stuff matters to you, watch the documentary The True Cost, which discusses the waste from clothing and textiles.
Here's a link to the trailer.
...Non-Nudists Hardest Hit"
We need food, clothing, and shelter...of wait, clothing is super-plentiful therefore prices are plummeting? That's terrible. ......?!!?
No one wants used clothes, because used clothes, with holes in it, that you can't return, cost too much.
Thrift shops used to have great deal. Now it's a great deal for them. At these garage sales still have good deals... for now.
Could say the same thing about Trump. No matter what is being discussed, Trump somehow makes it into the conversation.
I'm just making it up as I go along... Why can't someone invent something that'll convert the clothes into green energy (i.e. fuel) and feed it to Mr. Fusion (Back to the Future reference). That'll solve our clothing problem. :-)
Thrift stores are doing record business here in the USA... I have a feeling this article is BS.
I really doubt the African villages that have to boil their water can afford to buy new
Not to mention, the constant tidal wave of donated shoes and clothes meant annihilation for any nascent indigenous clothing, shoe, or textile market...which is normally a stable and consistent business.
-Styopa
Average clothes are definitely far less durable today than 20 years ago. They appear to cost less, but I believe cost more over the long term. My jeans used to last about 150 wear / wash cycles and now seem to be good for only half that. Other clothes are far less durable than that.
It seems as though we've entered into an age where having the latest clothes is more important than how much they cost. This turns durability into something the average consumer has no desire to pay extra for. Why pay more to facilitate donating?
The ultimate evolution of this would be to have a brand new outfit every time you dress. There could be a market there for a home grown clothing industry.
Manufacturers based in the US can't compete in the clothing industry as it exists. So, perhaps they should seek instead to disrupt the industry.
We should seek to develop a device similar in size to a washer-dryer combination that will break down old clothes and create new ones. It would likely need to have supplies in canisters that are replaced. There would also likely be components that can't be recycled in the machine and must be removed to a depot for recycling. So, a service would cart away collection canisters and install new supply canisters periodically.
The business would shift from manufacturing clothes overseas to manufacturing sophisticated machines and recycling supplies locally. Also, clothing design would be a completely separate largely community-based, open source activity that these suppliers would no longer have to concern themselves with.
3D printing technology which has already shown an ability to create crude clothes would be a promising starting point for this. Ultimately I think a tech that could break material down into fibers, reform fibers into threads, and weave new clothes, perhaps from many micro threads instead of long ones, would produce better feeling, seamless clothes than a print from drops approach.
Getting there involves shifting from designing machines that automate human activities (which is what the current clothing industry does) to designing a whole process including the end product that is optimized for real-time on-site production of single-use outfits with full recycling.
The only reason new clothes are so cheap is because of the labor exploitation in all steps of the chain making the production costs cheap.
Pay the textile industry laborers, the button makers, the garment sewers, and the retail employees selling the new clothes a living wage and we'll see the price gap increase dramatically.
Partner with a tech company to set up a corner where donors place their items on something like a fit bot and to have it automatically barcoded, photograph, categorize (size, brand, style), and tagged if they want a tax deduction receipt (or try it sans robot first, but really you want to make it easier than it would be for them to just ebay the stuff themselves), and have a computer automatically generate the receipt (I've waiting more than 30 minutes just to have someone sign off on my receipt before - could of done that work while I was waiting). Moreover, those clothes that are bar-coded, and cataloged, and photographed, can be automatically placed for sale in an an online market that the entire country has access to. And imagine how much easier it would be to shop (and maintain) the store if all the clothing had an easily identifiable size tag on it.
You can still let those that don't want receipts dump if you aren't getting enough people willing to chip in.
I have seen 10 years ago branded used clothes in Africa sold for peanuts. This year, I have seen clothes donated for the hurricanes in Philippines...being sold. So apparently, there is still a market.
What I do see going to all brand and good names clothe stores here, is that while men still can find good looking clothes, all the women clothes have turned to shit in the name of "fashion"....nowadays all the women clothing are of much lower quality, and remember me of the old clothing my mother used to have in the closet when I was young.
Junk...
"new clothes are becoming as cheap as used ones, and poor countries are turning their backs on the secondhand trade".
Let's see a new pair of jeans costs like 10 to 50 USD in shops in my country. A used pair costs starting 1 USD often tossed away practically new by some American that want the new model. This note seems like the ones shared in Microsoft seminars, where top worker discuss the world problems. Often in the tone of "This don't apply to me, then it doesn't apply to the rest of the world".
I can just roll up my clothes and smoke them when I'm done with them. I'll throw in a Tide pod for an extra kick.
don't have thrift stores. They have little outlets that only accept donations. Those donations never show up anywhere near the poor neighborhoods. I moved to here from a poorer city and was expecting the pickins to be pretty good. So when I got up here I cruised all the thrift stores for a couple months only to find junk and only junk time and time again. That's not completely true. Sometimes I'd find something marked up $10 more than new/ebay.
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I thought South Korea already dropped disco on the West with "Gangnam Style".
"I need food, but nobody will give me a job to earn money to buy food unless I am sufficiently fashionable." I consider a prerequisite for a need on some particular Maslow tier to lie on that same tier.
I remember that in the 70s and the 80s paper mills took cotton fabric and dresses to use for making cotton paper. They want only cotton and without buttons and so on. I remember that as a kid I collected the used clothes for the parish. Used clothes and blankets in decent state, especially the wool ones were repaied by some old widows and given to the poor.
I think the problem is that mixing different type of fabric is a pain for reuse or recycle.
I saw a post that women's clothing is more cheaply made; so is men's clothing. Maybe they don't want used clothes because they're falling apart too fast.
I know that a lot of shirts and pants are *much* thinner, and more cheaply made. Cheaply, as in they shrink when you wash them. When I was a kid (I'm a boomer), I remember seeing ads for "pre-shrunk" clothes. Now? Oh, you should dry clean all good cloths... because they're *crap*.
Another example: jeans, back in the fifties and sixties, had a thread count of better than 14. 10 years ago, you were lucky to find anything, except expensive ones (and why the hell are *jeans* expensive clothing?), that had a thread count over 9.
But of course fashion wants to sell you overpriced cheap clothes, since you're convinced that you wouldn't want to wear something that was *so* last month, right?
I've been very grateful over the years for thrift shops and Goodwill. It would have been much harder raising my kids and grandkids without them.
If it wasn't for AGW or Trump stories, msmash wouldn't really have much to offer here. God forbid (s)he actually post something tech related.
The clothing industry makes a few versions of the same thing for the average man. Women's clothing is so cheap and flimsy that it often falls apart before even being washed once. You can buy an entire wardrobe for an adult woman for less than $300. It would cost that much just to get a couple pairs of pants and some shirts for a man. Homosexuals, having brain chemistry closer to that of a woman, are also a problem when it comes to disposable clothing. They want one-time use clothing, just like women do. Trying to be "fashionable", rather than buying well-made clothing in styles that will never go out of fashion, is the problem. Women and homosexuals never want to be seen in public in the same outfit more than once. On top of that, when they are home alone, they want to be able to feel good about themselves by having as many material possessions as they can, which means clothing as cheap as possible so they can buy more and more of it. Having five different colors of the same piece of clothing is important. Having a hundred pairs of cute one-time use underwear and socks is important, total cost less than $40. Since that junk falls apart almost immediately, it really needs to go into the trash. Most of that clothing isn't even made of cotton now, so that massive amount of plastic waste is even more of a problem.
So Global Warming caused poor countries to be less poor and therefore have no need for second-hand clothes, thereby CAUSING Global Warming.
Once again showing the devastating and completely irreversible Global Warming that is literally the cause of everything -- and if you disagree you're obviously a big-old shill.
Stop plagiarising my posts you unoriginal fucking cunt.
That is a true fact.
Berkowits