Common Threads Round Up #16
The Tariff Times is back (plus a new resale platform focused on highlighting Black designers, Kate Middleton pulled something deep from her archives, and a fast fashion company attempts a rebrand).
🗓️ Tuesday, March 4th 2025
Source: Glossy
❓ How secondhand fashion can benefit from tariffs, new legislation - Glossy
Let’s talk tariffs! While most fashion brands are panicking about Trump’s new tariffs, ThredUp sees these tariffs as a unique opportunity for the resale market to capture more consumers as the price of new goods gets more expensive. This Vogue Business article discusses how consumers might react to tariffs - it’s more of a discussion topic than you might think, in fact #Tariffs was trending on TikTok last week. Businesses are still panicking - Steve Madden stated that tariffs would be a challenge to their future growth in their quarterly earnings report. And now Trump is floating a 25% tariff on EU goods as well…
↔️ PrettyLittleThing unveils rebrand as it moves away from fast fashion past - The Industry
Can a fast fashion brand rebrand and change its past? PrettyLittleThing is surely trying - not only have their clothing offerings been updated to more classic silhouettes, but their branding has been updated too. It’s giving less Love Island…but we’re not exactly sure what it’s giving more of.
🔵 Can we really not have good, cheap, and quickly-made clothing?
Interesting Venn Diagram from Derek Guy on Twitter (or X, if we really must call it that). Do we agree with this? That ‘not possible’ bit is what we’re trying to change at unspun with Vega™, but this newsletter isn’t about us so we won’t go too far down that rabbit hole, but you can read more about our tech here should you be curious.
🗑️ Return fees see more clothes end up in landfill as customers put off from sending items back- Mirror UK
Interesting to see this happen - two and a half years ago, Zara started charging for returns, citing (among other factors) the environmental impact of returns. And H&M announced last month that they’re increasing their return fees. However this article states that these increased return fees aren’t curbing consumption, but are actually leading to more clothes being tossed into landfills instead of being sent back to the vendors.
✨ This Platform Is Bringing Black Designers To The Forefront Of Sustainable Fashion - POCIT
Great interview with Nana Spio-Garbrah, founder of Kiraa, a resale platform dedicated to showcasing Black designers and African brands. Frustrated by the absence of these designers and brands on major resale sites, he created Kiraa to ensure these designers are not just visible, but valued in the sustainable fashion space. Kiraa is currently just online, but in the future he envisions a third space where people can come together IRL to meet other people interested in sustainable fashion and swap clothes.
👸 Revealed: Kate Middleton recycles 18-year-old jacket demonstrating her commitment to sustainable fashion - Daily Mail
Not the most groundbreaking news, but cool. We’d love a look into her fashion archives.
💶 Is Sustainable Fashion Losing Its Most Powerful Ally? - BOF
Europe has long led the charge of sustainable fashion from a legislation POV. With upcoming elections and economic concerns taking priority, policies like supply chain transparency and sustainability reporting are at risk of being watered down or delayed. If Europe won’t stand up for sustainable fashion, who will?
That’s it for now! Until next week 🤙
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