Fast Fashion & My Experience with SheIn

This week we are talking “Fast Fashion”. What is fast fashion? Think Charlotte Russe, Fashion Nova, H&M, and SheIn. Yes, SHE- IN. The name of the company used to be “SHE INSIDE”. They decided to shorten the name to make it easier for their global customers. Fast fashion has been around for a while! It is inexpensive clothing produced rapidly by mass-market retailers in response to the latest trends, according to the Google. When Cardi B says ” I could buy designer, but this Fashion Nova fit”, I just simply do not believe her.

While I usually enjoy a hefty thrift session, sometimes my online shopping curiosities get the best of me, so I spent $273.65 at Shein aaaaannnnd this is what happened.

First let’s talk about sizing. In this order I knew I was taking a gamble by mostly purchasing swimwear but I thought I would give it a shot. If I can give you any advice when shopping fast fashion it’s always size up. We all know sizing varies from brand to brand but I have never seen worse inconsistency than in fast fashion companies. Not only that but usually once you wear this item and wash it once, the sizing yet again changes due to the material shrinking and losing its shape. So yes, a shirt for $8 seems like a great deal but not if you only wear it once.

Looking at the price point I got 17 items for 273.65 averaging about $16 an item. Now in my opinion $16 for an entire swimsuit IS a steal. Yes and that’s exactly my point. Do I really think that from sourcing material, labor, and manufacturing costs, to shipping and being on my doorstep, that it really only costs $16? It doesn’t. Someone in that chain is getting stolen from. I could argue that it is me because the quality of the items I received are poor, but I know I’m not the worst off in that supply chain. That brings me to my next point; the quality is always poor. Always. How long are you keeping that item before it ends up in a landfill? My guess is not that long. This is extremely harmful to the environment as our fashion industry is the second most polluting industry in the world. That is a cost we ALL PAY.

Here is what I ordered:

Out of sheer disappointment I want to return everything however I am keeping two swimsuit tops and two sandals. The rest is going back. This might be the last straw for me and fast fashion. I know in our world today it is hard to make environmentally conscious purchases while trends are constantly changing. Some things we can do is: research the companies we buy from, buy secondhand, and buy local. Sounds simple but if you track your spending for a year, I bet you would be surprised how much money you spend on items that do not come from environmentally friendly companies.

Thank you for checking out this post and I hope this inspires you to think twice about filling your cart up with cheap, one-time wear items <3