9th January, 2021
Fast fashion is notorious for designer ripoffs. And while the ethical implications of these practices need no debate, the question of why these ripoffs have such great appeal is a fascinating one. Walking into Zara, you know you're not getting a Gucci bomber. Yet, putting on a Gucci-esque jacket gives you a glimpse into your dreamed life where you could casually afford luxury. Fast fashion knows your aspirations — and they work tirelessly to capitalise off them.
The same could be said about the thousands of brands out there who adopt the Eco aesthetic without holding up appropriate Eco standards.
On last week's post, I made an analogy of eco consumerism as the "world's biggest aspirational brand", outlining how Eco branding could lead to consumers compartmentalising sustainability as a distinct set of aspirations separate from other self-concepts. I thought it'd be interesting to extend this analogy further and explore its ripple effects on the greater brandscape — and more specifically, its relationship to greenwashing.
As Eco gains salience in the modern consumer identity, mass producers grounded on unsustainable practices face a pressing need to bridge that gap between their audience and their brand. In the aspirational economy, their position is akin to fast fashion: nobody (deliberately) wants to be un-Eco, the same way nobody wants to look cheap. Assuming they keep profitability as their top priority, these brands sit opposite to consumer aspirations, and their only way "forward" would be to appeal to these aspirations without all the associated costs. In fast fashion, this takes the form of copycat luxury. In the realm of Eco, this means "100% natural" drinks bottled in 100% plastic, shampoo bottles being beige/green just because they can be, and oil companies spending more on advertising their solar power plans more than they do on the plans themselves.
But here's the thing — mimicry is one of the driving forces of luxury. Fast fashion ripoffs amplify trends in the high-end market and perpetuate the societal aspiration towards them. The same could hardly be said about Eco, where "counterfeit greenness" could prematurely satisfy Eco desires before any "real" progress is made. Because, unlike luxury, price isn't a part of Eco's value in and of itself. The end goal of Eco isn't to stay exclusive to the filthy rich, but rather to replace every product in every household. How could it possibly compete with Eco-branded, yet Eco-blind mass producers?
The luxury economy is also kept alive by cycles of cultural redefinition. No matter how many replicas of the Versace dress there are, Versace will always be the lead in defining the next trend to be amplified. That role, in itself, is a reinforcement of what it means to be at the forefront of luxury — after all, imitation is the highest form of flattery. Yet the fight for Eco is one for the centuries, not the seasons. What happens when Eco goes out? How do we keep the aspirations alive for the long haul?
Most greenwashing discourses end up with the conclusion that more eco literacy and awareness is the way forward. And while the importance of planting skepticism towards generic eco claims cannot be overstated, I believe the present exploration also points to something fundamentally problematic about greenness becoming such a commodified aesthetic. On one hand, this digestible brand of environmentalism has taken hold of consumer aspirations in a way we never could've imagined. On the other, it has also made Eco increasingly vulnerable to shallow mimicry — the type that could kill the movement.
Of course, this whole brand analogy is not without limits. As part of my generalisation, I focused on a very specific brand of Eco that I believe has little to offer in the long run. Yet the death of Eco doesn't mean the death of the sustainable lifestyle. With rising conversations around more nuanced environmental issues, together with the implementation of well-regulated sustainability labelling, brands would eventually find it harder to convincingly greenwash than to change their business models around.
At the end of the day, green can be counterfeited, but sustainability itself cannot.
