For those of you who watched the drama Style, which was shown in 2007, you might be familiar with the expression, “fashion with an edge”. This phrase was used frequently by the main character, who works at a fashion magazine company, and the word “edge” is used as fashionable or stylish, so the phrase can be interpreted as “stylish fashion.” These days, many people, especially college students turn to fast fashion for clothes with an “edge.”
           Fast fashion quickly grasps the idea of what consumers are looking for, and constantly changes designs to meet with the current trend. Examples of South Korean fast fashion brands are Mixxo and SPAO. Some other fast fashion brands are GAP from the US, Spain’s MANGO, Japan’s UNICLO and Sweden’s H&M. UNICLO, which is very popular, first came to South Korea in September 2005. At first, their sales added up to 300 million won, and went up to 1.4 billion won in 3 years. In ZARA’s case, which came to South Korea in 2008, quickly grew to about 20 stores and is currently making a great amount of sales.
           Fast fashion is especially popular among people in their 20s, because of its characteristic of keeping up with the trends quickly and putting out clothes according to it. Also, just like fast food, the production process of fast fashion is very simple and fast, allowing the price to be relatively cheap. In times when prices keep going up, fast fashion cannot help but be popular.
           Many consumers may go looking for fast fashion because of its cheap price, but this can also cause excessive spending and cause people to become shopaholics. As mentioned before, fast fashion changes quickly since it is so sensitive to the current trend. Consumers are also well aware of this characteristic, which causes them to feel like they will not be able to buy a certain product if they don’t buy it immediately upon seeing it. This is even a more serious problem for college students, since most students don’t have a steady source of income.  
           Moreover, the production process of fast fashion causes a great amount of harm to the environment since it speeds along global warming. Since fast fashion stores constantly change their designs, clothes that are out of fashion are all simply thrown away. Therefore, fast fashion is pointed out as a source of environmental contamination due to all the waste of resources. Clothes that are not recycled are simply incinerated, and the harmful substances contribute in increasing the carbon emission rate. Another reason that fast fashion is so cheap is because it doesn’t include the social cost of dealing with such environmental problems. Another big problem is the exploitation of labor. It was a big shock when GAP was found to have been using child labor to make their clothes. If such a famous company was exploiting labor, there is a big possibility that other fast fashion companies are using such methods in making their clothes.
           Therefore, fast fashion can be said to have more cons than pros. Instead of buying a piece of clothing right upon catching sight of it, there is a need for consumers to keep in mind how they buy a product can affect the environment and the society overall. This will probably be harder for college students since following the trend can sometimes be irresistible for younger generations. Still, let’s try to keep in mind the alternative to fast fashion before going to another store; slow fashion, which emphasizes the concepts fair, eco and anti-consumerism.
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