Is Black Friday really so bad? Let’s take a look.

It’s that time of year again when soon enough, we’ll be inundated with messages, posts and emails about the big Black Friday sales and how they’re ‘too good to be true’! And generally, they really are too good to be true. The catch? Well, these kinds of sales are costing the planet, as well as often, garment workers’ wellbeing and animals’ lives. Seems like a pretty steep price to be paying for something that’s 99% off – as garments sold for just some cents worth were, by abhorrent fast fashion retailer Pretty Little Thing, last year.

Globally we consume 400% more clothing than we did two decades ago yet, on average, people are only wearing 50% of what they own. As we approach sales such as Black Friday, this fast fashion cycle only spins faster. Every year in Australia, 501 million kilograms of unwanted clothing ends up in landfill, and seeing as 80% of Black Friday purchases are thrown out after a very short lifespan, with most of the resources they are made from only getting one use before being wasted, you can bet it’s contributing to our waste and environmental problems. Australia also exports 94 kilograms of clothing each year and the repercussions are chilling, resulting in what could be described as clothing graveyards such as this in Chile’s Atacama Desert.

So, clearly there are problems with how we consume and treat clothes these days, and unfortunately these issues become exacerbated with the frenzied Black Friday sales. So let’s look deeper into the mechanics of these sales, and at the harms that are caused at each step.

Pre-sale

In order for a sale to happen, garments of course need to be made in the first place. In our current fashion system, much of the time making clothes means exploitative conditions for garment workers and the killing of animals used for their skin, fur, wool and feathers. To make matters worse, according to the IPCC the fashion industry is responsible for 10% of annual global carbon emissions.

Much of the time, clothes aren’t made on demand, meaning that much of this harm happens just for clothes to be forever unworn – an estimated one third of all clothing is never sold, with much of it being incinerated, or dumped.

The sale

Our habits of overconsumption take over when the countdown to Friday the 26th has finished and the sale is in full swing. We keep adding to cart because hey, it only happens once a year, plus everything’s so cheap and it’s such a bargain! It’s in this stage that we forget about the impact of our choices and how much those 8p dresses or 4p bathers are contributing to the hurt of people, animals and our planet.

Post-sale

The rush is over. The dress has been worn to the party, and now people are bored, itching for something new, because we’ve been told that outfit repeating is a fashion crime, rather than a sign that you own a washing machine.

Fast forward a few weeks and we start to see purchases move to the hidden, darkened corners of closets, before they’re eventually just thrown away, barely used. Some head straight into the bin with guilt and regret, and some are returned – which we know means going to waste, too.

Usually there are no second thoughts about this kind of behaviour as Black Friday is marketed to us as an exciting opportunity to shop till you drop. We’re fed faux self care claims that make us feel that in order to feel good, we need to buy more, and that we aren’t complete until we do. These lies only stand to serve the many fashion CEO’s who are already billionaires, but not our selves, our wallets, our warming planet, garment workers or non-human animals.

Clothing sent to landfill, rising carbon emissions and greenhouse gases, slaughtering of animals, and poverty wage labour are all part of the real-life horror story that is fast fashion and Black Friday sales. These fast fashion brands know this, yet they choose to prioritise profit and gains. And this isn’t just on Black Friday, but across the other 364 days of the year, as every second, globally, the equivalent of a rubbish truck filled with textiles and clothing goes to landfill.

The exception: mindful sale purchases

Sales like Black Friday are often used to entice us into buying something new for the sake of it. However, it’s important to note that sales can make things, including ethically and sustainably made things, more accessible, especially to people with lower incomes.

Let’s say there’s a fairly made shirt you’ve had your eye on for months; when a sale rolls around this might be the perfect opportunity to buy said shirt because it eases the financial toll. In this scenario, you were already planning to buy something that you knew you were going to love and wear for years to come, making it a thoughtfully considered purchase. We need to recognise that sales are significant to people with less economic privilege, and these kinds of mindful purchases are different to those which are prompted by the sale, often leading to the mindless consumption that we see on Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Where does that leave us?

Each of us has a responsibility to consider our fashion choices and where we spend our money. If you are going to shop on Black Friday, make sure to make a list of what you actually need and want (and have for some time), and that you know is made as ethically and sustainably as is accessible to you – and stick to that list.

If you want to do more, there are some great resources and initiatives that can help us to minimise our impact and flip the fast fashion narrative.

One organisation raising awareness and taking action on Black Friday is Fashion Revolution, and Collective Fashion Justice is proud to be partnered with them for their current campaign to #TakeBackBlackFriday.

This campaign encourages people to remind themselves and others that #LovedClothesLast, and to speak up to brands profiting from exploitation and waste. There are a myriad of ways to get involved in the campaign, including spreading the word on social media using their downloadable templates, which you might’ve seen floating around on Instagram recently.

If you’re looking for a sale that gives new life to your old, unloved, faded or stained clothes, keeping them out of landfill and curbing the need to buy more, look no further than Black Fridye.

All you have to do is send the clothes you want to be overdyed black, and they’ll arrive back on your doorstep newly black, revamped. In 2020 this was reported to reduce an average of 95% in carbon emissions compared to buying new clothes, per garment dyed. Extending the lifespan of something old, rather than buying more is a win-win situation for our wallets, wardrobes and the planet.

As always, you can learn alongside Collective Fashion Justice over on our website, Instagram and Twitter. Be sure to follow along as we approach Black Friday and hopefully we can make more sustainable and ethical choices this year.