Let’s date!

This is not a Tinder invite. Quite the opposite, as it seems Tinder actually encourages “use and discard” of people, love and relationships. This is quite the contrary, a first bold move to date apparel so that we can actually start tracking our environmental footprint in a meaningful way.

I have been harping on and on that degrowing the sector is the only way forward, and that in this “way forward” dating products is the key. How happy was I when this last Friday I was contacted by Katia Dayan Vladimirova who had actually done just that for her new underwear collection: done the deed!

Of course, this does not underscore that others have done this for a while, Bestseller has evidently done this for years, as well as Voice Norway. But I would claim that the way Katia has done this for her brand, Well Rounded, is stellar.

The issue here that is at the core of why this is important is the following. Before April 15th the EU Commission has asked for feedback on Textile Labeling Rules, and before April 22nd the Joint Research Center, EU’s go-to-experts, have asked for feedback on ESPR (Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Directive). For the latter, this is the second feedback for stakeholders, the first one was criticized by several, and perhaps not surprisingly but rather shocking, important feedback from above-mentioned have been ignored, misinterpreted or otherwise not been included.

That said, JRC’s session open for stakeholders to make input in the form of a webinar the week before Easter, was an eye-opener for many of us, in undressing the emperor, and his ‘new clothes’.

Even after so much push-back on that JRC seem to have two ‘fake news’ assumptions underpinning their whole ‘raison d’être’ for ESPR: That the environmental impact of apparel and textiles are the second most polluting (line 609 in the background document) is number one. The other one is not cited, but it is rather obvious it underpins the whole thinking and can be found easily through a google search: How important design is for predicting environmental footprint:

“It is estimated that over 80% of all product-related environmental impacts are determined during the design phase of a product. Eco-design aims at reducing the environmental impact of products, including the energy consumption throughout their entire life cycle.”

This is also ‘fake news’.

Enter “emotional durability”, which JRC ‘suddenly’ have embraced.

This, and associated behaviour traits of long-lasting products, is seen as something that can be ‘designed in’ in the product design. But design is widely recognised as a weak force in creating relationships, etc. that a wearer goes on to associate with a piece of clothing, according to Kate Fletcher, a leading researcher: “Many factors influence how long a product is used more than design, such as easy availability of new alternatives, marketing, price. Not only that, but there is no evidence that owning one meaningful garment prevents the acquisition of further pieces. Introducing regulation around emotionally durable design would not tackle the substantive sustainability challenge facing the textile and clothing sector, that of rising product volumes. Emotional durability is (therefore) not an effective intervention point in driving environmental change for textiles and clothing.”

The quote is from on-going work that will result in a feed-back document from Consumption Research Norway and hopefully some other heavy-weights in this space.

For years wardrobe studies have been a much more effective way of understanding the “pull” and “push” force that lead to consumers ridding themselves of apparel and textiles. Recently also waste audits are capturing valuable information on what state what we discard of is in. Are the things we get rid of “used up”? The answer is ‘no’, and it isn’t necessarily due to a worsening of “quality” that things go out of use. It is about availability of new and cheap stuff. And relentless marketing.

Which leads us back to why it will be so important to have dating in products. And why we were so happy to see this in praxis. One thing, as stressed by Luca Boniolo in ECOS during STICA’s Climate Week: this is important in relation to the commercial guarantee (which is currently two years). But it is also, important, he said to find out if what ends up in the different waste streams has been used for ten years or just a very short time. This would give us the data to see exactly what gives a “good” Duration of Service, something JRC and the EU Commission seem to think is rather impossible to find out. Or, rather, they think that ‘more durable, repairable, recyclable’ apparel will predict something which is absolutely impossible to predict.

In Consumption Research Norway SIFO’s latest research paper on The Impact of Modes of Acquisition on Clothing Lifetimes the conclusion is among other things that:

“The overall utilisation rate, whether we look at a private wardrobe, a country, or the world, is more important than the lifetime measured in years for an individual garment when discussing the environmental impact of clothing. Few uses per garment generate an increasingly less efficient industry, which thus develops in the opposite direction than the principles of the circular economy where the aim is to keep the products and materials in circulation at their highest use-value for as long as possible. Clothing lifetimes are affected by the number of items in the wardrobe, and therefore, more of the discussion should be about overall utilisation rather than measures, whether they are political or personal, that seek to increase the lifetime of individual garments.”

The simple act of dating will make such a big difference, it’s a no-brainer to start immediately to do so. At least if you are a producer of apparel, you think that consumers will actually keep and “use up”. Perhaps making it illegal to sell anything without dating, will have to be high on the EU agenda in order to actually tackle Shein and Temu, and other ultrafast fashion brands. This is what can actually level that playing field once and for all.

So let's start dating. Now!