Speaker 1: I'm t T and I'm Zakiah and from Spotify.
Speaker 2: This is Dope Labs.
Speaker 3: Welcome to Dope Labs, a weekly podcast that mixes hardcore science,
Speaker 3: pop culture.
Speaker 1: And a healthy docent friendship. So last week we talked
Speaker 1: all about how the landscape of fashion and e commerce
Speaker 1: and shopping has changed completely. Yes, but there was an
Speaker 1: aspect of this that we touched on.
Speaker 3: Very lightly that we knew that we needed to dig
Speaker 3: into in today's lab.
Speaker 1: And that is the idea of sustainability in fashion. So
Speaker 1: let's get into the recitation, all right, So what do
Speaker 1: we know?
Speaker 3: One thing that I know from a Mackenzie study that
Speaker 3: I've read is that clothing production from the year two
Speaker 3: thousand to the year twenty fourteen has doubled.
Speaker 1: What we also know is that a lot of the
Speaker 1: clothes that we purchase aren't made in the US right.
Speaker 3: A lot of it is coming from China, and China
Speaker 3: actually accounts for thirty percent of world apparel.
Speaker 1: Wow, So we know we have a huge clothing industry.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of clothes being made. People are buying
Speaker 1: way more I guess pieces or garments per person than
Speaker 1: they used to. How do we take all of that
Speaker 1: and make it tie into sustainability. How do we shift
Speaker 1: what's going on? That's a great question.
Speaker 3: Another thing I think we want to know is what's
Speaker 3: happening when the life of your clothing comes to an end?
Speaker 3: What are folks doing with their old clothes? And if
Speaker 3: we are generating waste from clothes, what is happening to it?
Speaker 1: Well, I know the global population hasn't doubled or increased
Speaker 1: sixty percent to match production or purchasing power that we see,
Speaker 1: So I want to know when we got so greedy?
Speaker 1: You know, what's happening if we're all buying so much
Speaker 1: more clothing? Are we just hoarding it? Are we hanging
Speaker 1: on to it? Are we turning it over quicker? Is
Speaker 1: it wearing out? I have questions. Okay, so we've talked
Speaker 1: about fast fashion.
Speaker 3: I want to know what is the opposite of fast
Speaker 3: fashion and how can we make things better for our
Speaker 3: global community.
Speaker 1: We're really focusing on ourselves as consumers, But what are
Speaker 1: the companies doing? Because at sixty eight garments of person,
Speaker 1: there's only so much impact that I can make, you know, right,
Speaker 1: it kind of has to start at the top two.
Speaker 3: They have to be doing the right things and doing
Speaker 3: them ethically before it even gets to us for us
Speaker 3: to really have a major impact.
Speaker 1: That's right. And then what about accessibility to everyone?
Speaker 3: It seems like sustainable fashion is on the tip of
Speaker 3: everyone's tongue these days, but does everybody have access to
Speaker 3: these things? Let's get into the dissection. Today's guest expert
Speaker 3: is Drew Heifitz.
Speaker 4: What's up, guys. My name is Drew Heifitz. I'm the
Speaker 4: owner of Frankie Collective and I have a couple other
Speaker 4: companies called Fison, frank Vintage, and the Rag Machine.
Speaker 1: Frankie Collective is an online retailer that sells vintage and
Speaker 1: reworked clothing.
Speaker 4: So what that means is we take secondhand in vintage
Speaker 4: clothing that typically would end up in the landfill or
Speaker 4: discarded or wherever it ends up most of the time
Speaker 4: the landfill, and we cut it and re sew it
Speaker 4: into new clothing to give it a second life, maybe
Speaker 4: update the fit, update the style, and bring it back.
Speaker 3: Another name for reworked clothing is up cycling or upcycled clothing,
Speaker 3: and Frankie Collective estimates that they have saved or upcycled
Speaker 3: sixty five thousand pounds of clothes every year.
Speaker 1: That's a lot of clothes.
Speaker 3: That's probably more clothes and is in like Mariah Carey's closet.
Speaker 1: I'm really hoping we can help our listeners visualize what
Speaker 1: we mean when we say upcycling, and specifically upcycling the
Speaker 1: way Frankie Collective does it. Mm hmm.
Speaker 3: They're taking old clothes and making them like brand new,
Speaker 3: and not just brand new, but unlike anything you would
Speaker 3: see in the store, So you're getting something that almost
Speaker 3: feels one of a kind. So let's rewind a little
Speaker 3: bit here, because I think to really understand why Frankie
Speaker 3: Collective is doing this, you have to kind of have
Speaker 3: an overview of the environmental impact of fashion, starting with
Speaker 3: your closet. How often do you do like a clearout
Speaker 3: of your closet? You know, a couple of year back,
Speaker 3: was at the beginning of the pandemic, Maricondo was I
Speaker 3: felt like she was in my house.
Speaker 1: Okay, she needs to come to mind. He was not there. Okay,
Speaker 1: she's not a friendly she's not welcome in my home.
Speaker 3: I was saying goodbye to so many things. I was
Speaker 3: having little conversations. Listen, I appreciate you shirt, you served
Speaker 3: your purpose and I'm grateful for you, but your time
Speaker 3: is done.
Speaker 1: You must go. Thank you. I think each season I
Speaker 1: kind of go through this purging process. But you also
Speaker 1: know tt that I move a lot.
Speaker 3: Yeah, my friend cannot stay in one place. She loves
Speaker 3: to be moving out of a place and moving in
Speaker 3: it seems yes, And so you know, just by that process,
Speaker 3: I'm purging quite a bit and going through things. I
Speaker 3: know that some people do like different things with their clothes.
Speaker 3: There's things where you can like sell your clothes.
Speaker 1: I would just take backs to Goodwill. What happens to
Speaker 1: that stuff? I'm always looking to see, does somebody have
Speaker 1: on my outfit that I donated, Like, what happens to it?
Speaker 3: I put my thing in that drop box and it's
Speaker 3: just kind of like out of side, out of mind.
Speaker 3: I'm like, those clothes disappeared.
Speaker 4: Most of our clothing gets donated. Everyone knows those bins
Speaker 4: you donate and it's like salvation army bin or wherever
Speaker 4: they are, or you can drop it at the back
Speaker 4: of a thrift store. Right. This is where the public
Speaker 4: perception gets blurry, because we typically think that all those
Speaker 4: clothes were donating goes right into that thrift store and
Speaker 4: gets sold. In reality, I think it's only something like
Speaker 4: five or ten percent of what we donate goes into
Speaker 4: those thrift stores.
Speaker 3: Yeah, according to the EPA, about eighty four percent of
Speaker 3: our clothing ends up in incinerators and landfills.
Speaker 4: They get so much more clothing than they can actually
Speaker 4: process so that the public can consume. And also they
Speaker 4: don't want to put out dirty things, stain things, rip things.
Speaker 4: People donate one leg of a gene, you know, they're
Speaker 4: just like, what do I do with this?
Speaker 1: Then I'm really curious about how these clothes end up
Speaker 1: in landfills, Like, what is the process from my donation?
Speaker 1: Who's judging them and saying, mmmm, it's the key it
Speaker 1: brought us? This not good enough? This is trash. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's rude.
Speaker 3: Drew says that many places that accept clothing donations will
Speaker 3: send unwanted clothing to facilities that will sort and package
Speaker 3: it by size and then sell the packages by the
Speaker 3: pound to international markets where it can be resold.
Speaker 4: Pakistan, India, Africa have huge street markets where they sell
Speaker 4: primarily American and European secondhand clothing. Pop culture is so
Speaker 4: based in America. People to watch American movies and TV shows,
Speaker 4: and they want those brands that they're seeing on TV
Speaker 4: and the movies and all these things. But again, a
Speaker 4: huge portion of that stuff, like in this whole process,
Speaker 4: just gets tossed because it doesn't fit the grade that
Speaker 4: people want, it's damaged, whatever happens, They put them in
Speaker 4: these huge thousand pounds biales compress clothing and they go
Speaker 4: to landfill. And there's whole clothing landfills in Africa that
Speaker 4: are like taking up massive amounts of space, and then
Speaker 4: tons of it goes to American landfills.
Speaker 1: The Council for Textile Reporting estimates that the average US
Speaker 1: citizen throws away or donates seventy to eighty pounds of
Speaker 1: clothing and other textiles annually. Seventy to eighty pounds every year.
Speaker 1: How many pairs of genes is that? And it says
Speaker 1: other textiles too, So that's like towels. Let's do the math.
Speaker 3: Eighty four percent of seventy five pounds of donated clothing.
Speaker 1: That's sixty three pounds of.
Speaker 3: Clothing that I thought was getting resold at a thrift store,
Speaker 3: but it's probably sitting in a landfill somewhere.
Speaker 1: And that's really sobering to think about, what are some
Speaker 1: of the alternate things we can do with the clothes
Speaker 1: we don't want to use anymore, especially now that I
Speaker 1: know they're going to the landfill.
Speaker 4: You're much better off giving your clothes to a friend
Speaker 4: who's gonna use it, or if you have kids clothes, like,
Speaker 4: give it to an expecting mom, whatever it is, because
Speaker 4: at least you know that it's most likely going to
Speaker 4: get used and passed on and not end up in landfill.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So sometimes I do that with my sisters. Like if
Speaker 3: I have stuff that I'm like, Okay, I've worn this
Speaker 3: once or twice and I don't want it anymore. Or
Speaker 3: I bought this thing it's really nice, but it wasn't
Speaker 3: the right size. I might ask my little sister, Hey,
Speaker 3: what do you think this, and I'll give it to
Speaker 3: her so she can have it. Also, you can donate
Speaker 3: to local shelters or nonprofit organizations, Yeah, in your neighborhood.
Speaker 3: So how do we accumulate all of these clothes in
Speaker 3: the first place? When you think about donating sixty or
Speaker 3: seventy pounds of clothes, that means you had to get
Speaker 3: at least sixty to seventy pounds of clothes. So that
Speaker 3: goes back to a lot of what we were talking
Speaker 3: about with doctor Kahn. How we shop is kind of changing,
Speaker 3: and we wanted to get Drew's perspective on fast fashion
Speaker 3: and what it is.
Speaker 4: First of all, it's driving down prices so deeply discounted
Speaker 4: that they can just have people buy and buy and
Speaker 4: not be concerned with the amount of waste they're creating.
Speaker 4: Quality gets compromised, which means that you end up throwing
Speaker 4: these things out after two three maybe one where they're
Speaker 4: putting out new stuff so fast, so fast, you know,
Speaker 4: a weekly basis, daily basis. Typically, when we look at
Speaker 4: fashion from a historic perspective, companies would have seasonal collections.
Speaker 4: This is my spring collection, this is my summer collection,
Speaker 4: this is my fall collection. Now it's like, this is
Speaker 4: Monday's drop, this is Tuesday drop, this is Wednesday drop,
Speaker 4: this is Thursday drop. And you're like, okay, you're coming
Speaker 4: at me so.
Speaker 1: Fast, you know, And I think the question becomes, what's
Speaker 1: the opposite, right, right, how do we slow down this train?
Speaker 1: How do I still look good? But right, it's slow
Speaker 1: fashion A thing I think it kind of.
Speaker 4: Is slow fashion to me would be brands where you
Speaker 4: could buy something and you can guarantee that they're going
Speaker 4: to last you. You know, maybe something that has a
Speaker 4: lifetime warranty that they'll fix it for you if it
Speaker 4: doesn't stand up to your standards, or a brand where
Speaker 4: the clothing is built to last you a few years.
Speaker 4: So it's like you can go buy one pair of
Speaker 4: pants that you know is going to like hold up
Speaker 4: for like three four years or two years, or you
Speaker 4: could buy ten pairs of fast fashion pants right and
Speaker 4: in the end, you would spend less on the one
Speaker 4: good pair than the ten pairs, even though in the
Speaker 4: moment you're like, well, I only paid thirty for those jeans.
Speaker 1: And it feels like some brands are trying to write
Speaker 1: the ship. One that I've seen is like Universal Standard
Speaker 1: and they are super sized inclusive, and they even have
Speaker 1: a program where if you order things and let's say
Speaker 1: your weight changes or your size changes within a year,
Speaker 1: they will ship you the size you want, like you
Speaker 1: can ship it back, they will exchange the sizes for you.
Speaker 1: I think there's also been a push but folks on
Speaker 1: Instagram who have been talking about capsule collections, and that's
Speaker 1: something that I really am kind of into It's like,
Speaker 1: these are the things that I'm gonna wear. I have,
Speaker 1: you know, a good pair of black jeans, a pair
Speaker 1: that I know I can go to, not like, oh
Speaker 1: this doesn't look right. It kind of fits, but sometimes
Speaker 1: you know how that is. Yeah, I've seen people do that.
Speaker 3: And one of the people that I follow, she has
Speaker 3: like a clothing rail and those are like her staple things.
Speaker 3: Like She's like, I always have a nice jean jacket.
Speaker 3: These are my staple blue jeans. This is a blazer
Speaker 3: that I really like. Yes, this is a button down
Speaker 3: shirt that I really like. And so she has like
Speaker 3: eight or nine pieces that she loves that are really
Speaker 3: good qualities.
Speaker 1: So then you're not really buying for the trends. If
Speaker 1: leopard is in, you may accessorize with leopard, you know,
Speaker 1: or you may do something like that, but you don't
Speaker 1: find yourself moving through each season. You're now I got
Speaker 1: to get Poka dout pants. Now it's time for bootcut jeans,
Speaker 1: which are those back?
Speaker 3: I saw somebody wearing low rise jeans and I felt
Speaker 3: like I could weep. No way will I ever go back.
Speaker 1: I like my genes to fit like a turtleneck in
Speaker 1: addition to the efforts on the consumer side around like
Speaker 1: you know, capsule collections and just buying things that really fit. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, we're seeing a lot more marketing, you like
Speaker 1: the Little Green Leaf brand saying that they are selling
Speaker 1: us clothing that's sustainable or ethically sourced.
Speaker 3: And ethically sourced means that the workers, the people that
Speaker 3: are making the clothing are not in environments that are
Speaker 3: unsafe this non sweatshop situation, and that like if they're
Speaker 3: working with anything that has to do with like dye
Speaker 3: or chemicals, that they have the right personal protective equipment
Speaker 3: or ppe to do their job safely.
Speaker 4: So when you actually break it down, something that is
Speaker 4: sustainable means we can do it forever and ever and
Speaker 4: ever and ever, and the resources for that are never
Speaker 4: going to be depleted and it will keep replenishing itself. Right.
Speaker 4: I don't think any of it is sustainable. I don't
Speaker 4: think the whole industry. I don't think what we're doing
Speaker 4: to a degree is completely sustainable. You know, there's always
Speaker 4: some kind of waste, and there's always something that's not perfect.
Speaker 1: Some people in the clothing industry are trying to steer
Speaker 1: away from using the term sustainability, and a lot of
Speaker 1: environmental scientists and researchers are encouraging them to do. So.
Speaker 4: The sustainable term is a blanket term where everyone's like, ooh,
Speaker 4: that sounds great, that's cool, maybe I'll buy that. That
Speaker 4: doesn't say anything, right, and then when you break it down,
Speaker 4: like you said, into sustainably sourced or organic or non
Speaker 4: toxic dyeing or all the other things that people use,
Speaker 4: that kind of gets more specific. And I think that's
Speaker 4: probably a better way to.
Speaker 1: Go, you know, I really like that more of a
Speaker 1: spectrum of sustainability. Yeah, so even if you can't upcycle
Speaker 1: or rework or trade old clothing, there are things you
Speaker 1: can do from the jump to increase this life cycle. Right.
Speaker 3: I had all these old sweatshirts and recently I was like, okay,
Speaker 3: I need to get rid of some of these sweatshirts.
Speaker 3: The kise you know I own, yes, what feels like
Speaker 3: mountains of sweatshirts. I wear sweatshirts all year round, and
Speaker 3: so I decided I wanted to get rid of some
Speaker 3: of them.
Speaker 1: And so I was like, Okay, what can I do.
Speaker 3: I know that you know, after talking to Drew that
Speaker 3: donating them probably isn't the right thing to do. So
Speaker 3: I went on Twitter and I asked, you know, have
Speaker 3: all these old clothes, what should I do with them?
Speaker 3: And someone suggested that I just cut them up and
Speaker 3: use them as like cleaning supply, so like stuff that
Speaker 3: I can use to like dry off dishes, you know,
Speaker 3: to like clean windows or clean floor.
Speaker 1: And I thought that that was such a great idea.
Speaker 3: And so it's cool to imagine a second or third
Speaker 3: or fourth life for your clothes when you're finishing wearing them.
Speaker 4: We just all have to be looking to produce less
Speaker 4: waste and think about the things we're doing and every
Speaker 4: facet of our lives all the time.
Speaker 1: Well, we're going to take a break, but there's a
Speaker 1: lot more to come, including how the global labor shortage
Speaker 1: is affecting the fashion world and some surprising news about
Speaker 1: those popular clothing rental services too.
Speaker 3: We're back and we've been talking with Drew Heifitz, the
Speaker 3: owner of Frankie Collective, about fashion and how to be
Speaker 3: more eco conscious consumers of clothing.
Speaker 1: And we can't really have this conversation without talking about access.
Speaker 1: That's also a big factor in making the right decisions
Speaker 1: for ourselves, you know, so true. If I have to
Speaker 1: drive across town to get where the more ethically sourced
Speaker 1: clothing is, that's already putting it out of bounds for me.
Speaker 1: That's already a barrier. What if I don't have a car,
Speaker 1: and if I do have a car, and am I
Speaker 1: concerned about contributing to pollution in another way? And the
Speaker 1: elephant in the room that we're not talking about is
Speaker 1: that often organic or responsibly sourced clothing is more expensive.
Speaker 1: These are all these different filters you have to assess
Speaker 1: your decisions through.
Speaker 3: This is just like what we were talking about when
Speaker 3: we talked about food and about access to healthy food.
Speaker 3: Like if it's so expensive, then only certain groups of
Speaker 3: people of a certain status have access to it.
Speaker 4: The system has to change where doing the right thing
Speaker 4: is the same price right, where it's the same for
Speaker 4: everyone and everyone has accessibility to it.
Speaker 3: Like Drew said, accessibility is so important, and that goes
Speaker 3: for accessibility to information too. The more we know about
Speaker 3: our clothing and where and how it's made, the better
Speaker 3: equipped we are to make choices about what we wear.
Speaker 3: One thing that a lot of people don't know about
Speaker 3: clothing fabric is that a lot of our clothing contains plastic,
Speaker 3: and through the degradation of our clothes, whether it's through
Speaker 3: washing or wherever our clothes end up, if we aren't
Speaker 3: reusing them, it introduces tiny particles into our environment called microplastics.
Speaker 4: Microplastics are a huge problem. Right when we wash our clothes.
Speaker 4: Microplastics come off any synthetics, so basically fleece, polyester nylons,
Speaker 4: these products are made of petroleum plastic based materials, and
Speaker 4: then they shed these tiny particles. The particles go get
Speaker 4: washed out into the ocean. Eventually through our system they're
Speaker 4: too small. This is kind of like out of sight,
Speaker 4: out of mind problem that not a lot of people
Speaker 4: think about or know about.
Speaker 3: We as humans on this planet, use a lot of plastic.
Speaker 3: There's plastic in everything, there's plastic in our clothes, there's
Speaker 3: plastic in everything that's around us, and so that creates
Speaker 3: a lot of plastic waste. And the thing about plastic
Speaker 3: is that it doesn't degrade. It lives forever, essentially, and
Speaker 3: so that creates a problem with the environment. Because we're
Speaker 3: putting these things in landfills. There's a lot of plastic
Speaker 3: that goes into our waste water, and that waste water
Speaker 3: makes its way out to the ocean, and then, as
Speaker 3: we talked about with Ayana Elizabeth Johnson in LAP twenty eight,
Speaker 3: that water evaporates, goes into the sky and then rains
Speaker 3: down upon us.
Speaker 1: And I think the thing I really want everybody to remember,
Speaker 1: you know, is when we say plastics, we think about
Speaker 1: plastic bags and plastic that we can see, you know,
Speaker 1: And that plastic is already like film, plastic hard enough
Speaker 1: to capture. But you're talking about plastic that is so
Speaker 1: small that it's difficult to recapture. Right.
Speaker 3: You would only be able to see them if they
Speaker 3: are grouped up in large groups. But what also is
Speaker 3: happening is that when it's in the ocean, those microplastics,
Speaker 3: because they're so small, they get carried up with the
Speaker 3: evaporated water from the ocean, which goes into the clouds,
Speaker 3: and then as either rains or snows, the microplastic comes
Speaker 3: down from the clouds and then back onto the earth.
Speaker 3: So while it's in the water, we have fish that
Speaker 3: are eating microplastics unknowingly. So I saw a study a
Speaker 3: while ago that was saying that probably every piece of
Speaker 3: fish that we consume at this point has microplastics in it.
Speaker 3: And then there was a study from twenty nineteen where
Speaker 3: these researchers were in the Arctic and they were collecting
Speaker 3: snow samples from the Arctic, and they said per lead
Speaker 3: of melted snow, there were ten thousand microscopic particles of
Speaker 3: plastic in it, ten thousand per leader. And so it
Speaker 3: just lets you know that our water and our plant life,
Speaker 3: and our animal life, and even just ourselves, we are
Speaker 3: consuming so much plastic.
Speaker 1: You know, microplastics are harmful. You get bioaccumulations. Small little
Speaker 1: organisms consume these microplastics. Bigger organisms consume lots of microplastics.
Speaker 1: Fish consume those bigger organisms. We consume fish, you know.
Speaker 1: So then you have microplastics circulating throughout our entire ecosystem,
Speaker 1: and when they're in the body, they're harmful. They're physically harmful,
Speaker 1: and they can disrupt biological function, like of your immune
Speaker 1: system and affect your growth and reproduction.
Speaker 3: Frankie Collective has been trying in their own way to
Speaker 3: make a huge dent on the problem of clothing and
Speaker 3: textile ways, and Drew says that over the past few
Speaker 3: years they've really taken off.
Speaker 1: The conversation has also really grown on social media and
Speaker 1: through several documentaries like The True Cost, which came out
Speaker 1: in twenty fifteen, which highlights not only the devastating environmental
Speaker 1: impact of fast fashion, but it also highlights the human
Speaker 1: rights abuses that are happening due to the rising demand
Speaker 1: of cheap clothing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it feels like now everybody's talking about it.
Speaker 4: I would say even like the last five years have
Speaker 4: been the biggest movement in that kind of realm of
Speaker 4: public perception that we need to be more sustainable. It
Speaker 4: has a whole following now, a whole sector of people,
Speaker 4: a whole group of people that are really like again,
Speaker 4: there's levels to it, but are looking for it, demanding it.
Speaker 4: And that's the basis to everything. If the people want it,
Speaker 4: the people demand it, the people buy it, then it
Speaker 4: all falls into place because you literally vote for everything
Speaker 4: with your money. It's like so simple. So you've got
Speaker 4: to put your money where your mouth is and you
Speaker 4: got to vote with your money.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: This also makes me think of what renting clothes, those
Speaker 3: services where you can rent clothes like rent the Runway,
Speaker 3: Newly or Guinnybee.
Speaker 1: These services provide users access to.
Speaker 3: Some of the top fashion brands without the financial commitment
Speaker 3: and without having to go into the store. So for
Speaker 3: a flat rate or a monthly feed, you can go
Speaker 3: onto their website, you pick what you want, and then
Speaker 3: you wear it for or you know, whatever event that
Speaker 3: you have or whatever you need that clothing for, and
Speaker 3: then you send it back and the cost varies. You
Speaker 3: can expect to spend anywhere from sixty to two hundred
Speaker 3: dollars per month. So it seems like a great way
Speaker 3: to keep your look looking first, you know, without creating
Speaker 3: a lot of waste, right.
Speaker 4: I mean, you would think the rental market's fairly new,
Speaker 4: like rent the Runway or Urban Outfitters has a rental program. Now,
Speaker 4: I believe from a perspective of convenience and fashion, it's
Speaker 4: kind of dope because you're like, you can every month
Speaker 4: get a new box of put in your closet, send
Speaker 4: it back, get a new box of and rotate it out.
Speaker 1: But a new study that came out in July in
Speaker 1: Environmental Research Letters actually argues that renting and recycling clothes
Speaker 1: is less sustainable than just buying them. We can't win,
Speaker 1: we can't win. In this study, a group of research
Speaker 1: scientists in Finland calculated the greenhouse gas emissions connected to
Speaker 1: five different ways of consuming clothing. The main issue is
Speaker 1: that the way these companies are currently operating, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of transportation required to deliver rent it clothes from
Speaker 1: the warehouse to your doorstep, and so that really adds
Speaker 1: up in terms of emissions.
Speaker 4: I don't think it's much more sustainable than producing clothing market,
Speaker 4: to be honest. And then that argument also travels over
Speaker 4: to like e commerce in general, everything's getting shipped, everything's
Speaker 4: getting shipped, right, one garment, one T shirt's getting shipped
Speaker 4: around the world maybe a couple times, three times. So
Speaker 4: again it's like where do we draw the line what
Speaker 4: is right for you?
Speaker 3: This goes back to fast fashion and slow fashion. Renting
Speaker 3: clothes is still based on cycling through the newest trends
Speaker 3: and sending clothes back when they're no longer in style.
Speaker 3: This is kind of like fast fashion following us. No
Speaker 3: matter how hard we try to act sustainably, we can't
Speaker 3: escape it. Sciences say that the most sustainable thing you
Speaker 3: can do is buy less clothes and wear them for longer.
Speaker 3: There's also things that rental companies can do to improve
Speaker 3: their emissions, like using forms of trans for that are
Speaker 3: low to zero emissions, but that hasn't happened yet.
Speaker 4: Obviously, you have to be happy and get the cool
Speaker 4: shit that you want, but you also want to do
Speaker 4: it in the best way. It's like that is such
Speaker 4: a massive umbrella of opinions and arguments and facts and
Speaker 4: oil consumption and all these things. So I'm just gonna say, like,
Speaker 4: you got to make that call for yourself, you.
Speaker 1: Know, and maybe you draw the line at regularly renting
Speaker 1: your day to day wardrobe. So maybe you decide, I'm
Speaker 1: only going to rent something for this really special event.
Speaker 1: You know, I want this one of a kind vintage
Speaker 1: dress for my cousin's wedding. Right, Dan, you do your
Speaker 1: research and you decide what's best for you. I remember
Speaker 1: when something similar happens.
Speaker 3: Oh, for our food episode, uh huh.
Speaker 1: We had talked about all these different things.
Speaker 3: You know, they were saying cow's milk, you know, it's
Speaker 3: bad for agriculture and the way that it's produced and
Speaker 3: all these things like that. So it's like not ethical
Speaker 3: to drink cows milks. I said, Okay, I no longer
Speaker 3: drink cow's milk. I am now one of the elites
Speaker 3: now I drink almond milk, you know, And so me
Speaker 3: thinking that now I'm fancy and I'm with it, and
Speaker 3: I'm helping the environment and I'm a better person. I
Speaker 3: go on Twitter, Hey, y'all, I drink almond milk now.
Speaker 1: And then people were like, you drink almond milk.
Speaker 3: Do you know how much water it takes to make
Speaker 3: one almond?
Speaker 1: That's so bad for the environment. I was like, well, dang,
Speaker 1: what am I supposed to do now?
Speaker 3: And they're like, you have to drink oat milk, And
Speaker 3: I was like, well, probably in six months, you're gonna
Speaker 3: tell me that oat milk requires the blood of your
Speaker 3: first child to get the oats or something like that.
Speaker 3: I feel like I can't when you can really end
Speaker 3: up driving yourself crazy trying to keep up with some
Speaker 3: of these things.
Speaker 4: You know, if it doesn't sit right with you, look
Speaker 4: it up, get the facts, figure out what works for
Speaker 4: you and your own life, and just do the best
Speaker 4: you can, you know.
Speaker 1: And one thing we've been hearing a lot about lately
Speaker 1: is the global labor shortage, which low key is tied
Speaker 1: to the global low wage issue. M So, you know,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of industries that are in a
Speaker 1: state of constant flux as company struggle to find applicants
Speaker 1: and demand is just expected to continue to rise. Just
Speaker 1: in the US, job openings hit a record of ten
Speaker 1: million in June of twenty twenty one, and then as
Speaker 1: of July, the overall unemployment rate was five point four percent,
Speaker 1: but it was even worse in the retail industry specifically
Speaker 1: because there was six point four percent unemployment. Wow. And
Speaker 1: so that's just retail in the stories. That's not counting
Speaker 1: labor shortages and factories where clothes are being made shortages
Speaker 1: and distribution shortages with cargo ships and truck drivers who
Speaker 1: deliver clothing to the stories to be sold. And you know,
Speaker 1: Christopher Mims from the Wall Street Journal and our guests
Speaker 1: from LAP thirty nine has a book that talks about
Speaker 1: that shortage, especially around truck drivers and transportation. It's called
Speaker 1: Arriving Today. So we asked Drew, how should we be
Speaker 1: framing this issue within the context of sustainability and is
Speaker 1: there some way we might need to think about restructuring
Speaker 1: fashion overall when we're considering these shortages.
Speaker 4: When you look at use clothing and resell projections, it's
Speaker 4: going up. It's going crazy. There's been some numbers put
Speaker 4: out that include sneakers, which is a huge part of
Speaker 4: it luxury streetwear. And then say, secondhand, the numbers projected
Speaker 4: for the next five years are like going to quadruple right,
Speaker 4: because it's close to home, it's becoming more accessible. Like
Speaker 4: you said, we're so reliant on supply chains from Asia,
Speaker 4: from China and other Asian countries like Korea and Vietnam
Speaker 4: and other places. We're so reliant on those supply chains
Speaker 4: that if they shut down on us on America in particular,
Speaker 4: I mean Canada is the same, we're screwed, heavily screwed.
Speaker 4: What can we do in our lives to say kind
Speaker 4: of help and get around that or try to help
Speaker 4: more local things do better. If you have the option
Speaker 4: to buy a product that somebody in your town made,
Speaker 4: or somebody in China made, maybe buy somebody in your
Speaker 4: town because that way it'll increase the demand or that
Speaker 4: locally that will eliminate a supply chain issue.
Speaker 3: But the other thing that Drew pointed out is that
Speaker 3: it's our responsibility as consumers to educate ourselves about what
Speaker 3: efforts a company is making to become more sustainable and
Speaker 3: environmentally friendly, because even if a company is marketing itself
Speaker 3: as quote unquote sustainable, that doesn't always mean they're actually
Speaker 3: doing the work.
Speaker 4: Greenwashing is very prevalent now, and we sort of said
Speaker 4: how a lot of companies are jumping into the space
Speaker 4: of sustainable or eco friendly in all these different ways,
Speaker 4: and the marketing is coming out so fast and heavy.
Speaker 4: Companies will market whatever works. They're ab testing on you.
Speaker 4: They're throwing ads at you, whatever you like, They're gonna
Speaker 4: throw it at you harder. We really should be doing
Speaker 4: a little bit more research.
Speaker 1: This isn't that different from when you see foods in
Speaker 1: the grocery store marketing as natural, like what do you
Speaker 1: mean by that? Or even organic, but organic is just
Speaker 1: part of the brand name, right.
Speaker 3: It'll be like organic but with a K at the end.
Speaker 1: Like come on, baby, we know that that's not right.
Speaker 1: That ain't no organic.
Speaker 4: Right again, voting with your dollar, but voting with your
Speaker 4: eyes and what you view and what you choose to acknowledge,
Speaker 4: and if you're gonna buy something, maybe just do a
Speaker 4: little more research to see if that marketing was actually
Speaker 4: correct and stands up to your personal filter of what
Speaker 4: you decide is good for your own life.
Speaker 1: And that's something I can really get behind. Tt me too.
Speaker 3: It's your personal filter. You can't change every single thing.
Speaker 3: It's gonna be what matters most to you. It's not
Speaker 3: just about you know once every four years or every
Speaker 3: two years. You can every day be making a statement
Speaker 3: with how you place your money.
Speaker 1: Because that's exactly what shopping is, if you break it down,
Speaker 1: voting with your dollar. All right, it's time for one
Speaker 1: thing the Keia. What's your one thing? My one thing
Speaker 1: is a book this week. It is Stop Telling Women
Speaker 1: to Smile Stories of street harassment by visual artists Tatiana
Speaker 1: Fazla Le's All Day. You can find her at t
Speaker 1: l y n n faz dot com.
Speaker 3: I love that and I will definitely be purchasing. My
Speaker 3: one thing this week is also a book. It's by
Speaker 3: Ajah Barber and it's right in line with what we've
Speaker 3: been talking about over the last couple of episodes. It's
Speaker 3: called Consumed, The Need for Collective Change, Colonialism, climate change,
Speaker 3: and Consumerism. It is so good, so definitely pick that
Speaker 3: up as well.
Speaker 1: That's it for Lap fifty three and a wrap on
Speaker 1: our episodes on fashion call Us at two O two
Speaker 1: five six seven seven zero two eight, and tell us
Speaker 1: what you thought or if you have an idea for
Speaker 1: a lap we should do this semester. Tell us that
Speaker 1: too really love hearing from you. That's two O two
Speaker 1: five six seven seven zero two eight, And don't forget
Speaker 1: there's so much more for you to dig into on
Speaker 1: our website. There'll be a cheat cheat there for today's
Speaker 1: lab and additional links and resources in the show notes. Plus,
Speaker 1: you can sign up for our newsletter, so check it
Speaker 1: out at Dope labspodcast dot com. Special thanks to today's
Speaker 1: guest expert Drew Hifitz. You can find him on Instagram
Speaker 1: at Drew Hiphiz. That's d r E w h E
Speaker 1: I F E t Z and at Frankie Collective.
Speaker 3: You can find us on Twitter and Instagram at Dope
Speaker 3: Labs Podcast.
Speaker 1: And TT's on Twitter and Instagram at dr Underscore t
Speaker 1: s h O.
Speaker 3: And you can find Zakia on Twitter and Instagram at
Speaker 3: z said So. Dope Labs is a Spotify original production
Speaker 3: from Mega Own Media Group. Our producers are Jenny ratlit
Speaker 3: Maass and Lydia Smith of WaveRunner Studios. Editing in sound
Speaker 3: design by Rob Smerciak, Mixing by Hannes Brown. Original music
Speaker 3: composed and produced by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex Sugier from Spotify.
Speaker 3: Creative producers Candice Manriquez Wren and Corin Gilliard. Special thanks
Speaker 3: to Shirley ramos Yasmine of Fifi, camu Elolia, Till krat
Speaker 3: Key and Brian
Speaker 1: Marquis Executive producers from Mega OH Media Group, r us
Speaker 1: T T Show Dia and Zakiah Wattley