The Impact of Micro-Trends
The year 2020 was a rough patch for all of us, however it definitely sparked a lot of creativity in the fashion industry. Plenty of fashion trends are making a strong comeback and people are wearing trends from the past. For example, “y2k” has been one of the biggest 2020 fashion trends since it has resurfaced. Now people are wearing low rise jeans and colorful tank tops that normally would be out of trend. A lot of these trends have helped people express themselves. Yet, with social media being such a huge part of our lives and the industry, a lot of these new popular fashion trends are barely lasting 2 months. These trends are called micro-trends.
A micro-trend is similar to a normal fashion trend, despite the fact that it does not last as long. When a fashion trend doesn’t last long it’s because most people dislike it. With micro-trends this is very different, people will actually like the trend, only for it to last a couple weeks or months. What are we blaming for this? Social Media. Since social media is so popular, clothing brands and items tend to become popular quickly. Social media can be great for business because brands are making tons of money on their products, however this is when fast fashion brands step in. When a fast fashion brand see’s a certain article of clothing getting attention, they will make clothes very similar or identical to them and will sell them on their website. As the brand advertises on social media, users flock to join in on the trend. Lot’s of teens aspire to take part in these micro-trends and that’s when they look to Fast Fashion companies. Because these companies sell their clothing for cheap prices, lots of people, particularly the ones in the upper class families, will spend lots of money on their websites. This is where these teens need to be held accountable, it’s not like they can’t afford higher end companies that aren’t part of fast fashion. Social media plays such an important role in a lot of people’s lives, it’s quite popular for people to post hauls.
As of today, July 19th 2021, the hashtag #haul on tik tok has over 9.0 billion views and counting. Fast fashion companies’ clothing is very cheap, so they can buy a lot of clothes for a small amount of money. Now there are a lot of people that can only afford to buy from fast fashion brands. Although it isn’t great, this is fine because people who can’t afford lot’s of clothes tend to take care of their clothes better than people who can afford higher end companies. The problem doesn’t revolve around those people, the problem is about people in the upper class spending $600 on a fast fashion company's clothes every other week to stay relevant. Buying second hand clothing, as well as buying sustainable clothing from environmentally friendly brands is the best option when you need new clothes. People can stay relevant, and are helping the environment when buying second hand clothing. In 2020, SHEIN made close to 10 billion dollars in sales. A lot of people in upper class families that buy all this clothing from these fast fashion brands end up throwing away most of these clothing items once these micro-trends aren’t popular anymore. Now, fast fashion clothes are normally made out of polyester and this isn’t good because polyester is a plastic based material. 60% of garments on retail shelves today are made out of polyester, and polyester can take up to 200 years to decompose.
A year ago, Kendall Jenner wore a House of Sunny dress and the internet blew up. This dress is one of the most popular micro-trends of 2021, because so many fast fashion brands made dupes of the dress and made thousands of dollars off of it. Discarding clothes so quickly is absolutely terrible for the environment, especially because 84% of clothing ends up in landfills or incinerators and the average person throws away 70 pounds of clothing per year. The Fashion Industry is an amazing place where people are able to express themselves and can show off their strengths. My biggest hope is that these fashion trends slow down and don’t cycle through so quickly and won’t have such a negative impact on the environment.