Yet another virtue signal law in Europe that won’t actually have the desired effect.
EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
761–770 of 894 posts
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#762Earlier quoted context omitted.
China for decades paid the U.S. and Europe for their "recycling", this practice was only banned in recent years. Clothes seem more valuable than plastics waste.
clothes is plastics waste
Can be, but there are also natural fibers from e.g. cotton, wool or hemp. But yeah many fast fashion products are polyester..
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#763Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not. Read their comment and mine. This was always, and will always be a thing. It's not a burden, just a marginal cost of business. Instead of paying a European company a €40k to destroy your broken products, you can pay an African one €10k to "recycle" your product. Best of all, you're legally forced to. I can see hundreds of companies lobbying for this because it completely takes them off the hook. "The law say…
There is enough local fraudulent waste management companies that shipping things to Africa to have it "recycled" is just a waste of money and time. Sweden recently had one of the largest fraud cases involving a waste management company, which also became the largest environmental case in Swedish history. The scheme is fairly simple. The criminals rent some land, dump the stuff there, and then have the company go bust…
Are you referring to this case? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/17/swedish-queen-... Thanks
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#764Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. Modern clothing is terrible, plastic filled, hardly resists multiple washings. This isn't the 1990s/2000s anymore where you could buy mid budged solid apparel and keep it forever. The gold existed, up to pre COVID. But since then and the rapid spread of fast fashion collecting cloth wastes is a bad business. 2. The market for vintage quality clothing is super strong and booming. You don't need to export it. 3. No…
1. You can buy a cotton tshirt from LIDL for 3 bucks and it'll hold for years. It won't be cut perfectly or have the softest material but it's definitely not bad. Of course, if I get it from Temu for 6 cents it'll probably fall apart in a week, but modern clothing isn't really covered by "the cheapest thing I can find". Same for ultralight fabrics, that, while lovely in summer, usually get trashed in a season or two…
Cheap cotton cannot hold for years, the fiber length and yarn quality makes it simply impossible. On top of that, cheap cotton is bleached and fast dyied which makes the clothing change after few washings.
I mean if you mean "hold" like, you can't still wear it albeit it looks nothing like it did two washings before, of course it does.
But then you look exactly like what you buy, someone with worn low quality clothing which looked nice in the shop and first wear.
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#765RIP what is left of true third world economies. It is about to get dumped on with even more "donations" that destroys and prevents local industry.
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#766It’s shocking to see this legislated. As if companies are just out here wantonly destroying otherwise valuable goods that could have been easily sold at a profit instead. I guarantee this problem is far more complex and troublesome than the bureaucrats would ever understand, much less believe, yet they have no problem piling on yet another needless regulatory burden.
They quite clearly are. Burberry was caught a while ago https://www.bbc.com/news/business-44885983 , but it's well known that every major upmarket brand was doing it to avoid the loss of prestige of sending the items to outlets.
I don't doubt that some luxury organizations destroy unsold inventory rather than allow it to diminish the status of their brand. My claim is that if they could have sold that inventory at a profit, they would have.
It's theirs to do with as they please. They paid for it to be made.
If you don't like how they run their business, don't buy the overpriced garbage they sell.
People seem to be so concerned about externalities like CO2 emissions, but it's difficult to believe this problem represents a scale even remotely meaningful in that area. It feels like the plastic straw bullshit that took over the US for a few years. A useless, symbolic gesture that causes far more harm than good.
As a side note, it's a weird feeling to jump to the defense of an industry I generally despise, but the regulation just seems so ludicrous.
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#767Earlier quoted context omitted.
They quite clearly are. Burberry was caught a while ago https://www.bbc.com/news/business-44885983 , but it's well known that every major upmarket brand was doing it to avoid the loss of prestige of sending the items to outlets.
I don't doubt that some luxury organizations destroy unsold inventory rather than allow it to diminish the status of their brand. My claim is that if they could have sold that inventory at a profit, they would have. It's theirs to do with as they please. They paid for it to be made. If you don't like how they run their business, don't buy the overpriced garbage they sell. People seem to be so concerned about external…
>It's theirs to do with as they please. They paid for it to be made.
This is not how that works. You have to pay for things within a legal framework setup by the government. If the legal frameworks changes then you have to deal with that.
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#768Fast-fashion, fast-furniture, fast-food, fast-news should all be regulated. They destroy our planet fast.
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#769Earlier quoted context omitted.
They quite clearly are. Burberry was caught a while ago https://www.bbc.com/news/business-44885983 , but it's well known that every major upmarket brand was doing it to avoid the loss of prestige of sending the items to outlets.
you can try to reason with the people who post comments like the one you're responding to, but the truth is they are just there waiting for anything a regulator does to desparage it, defend corporate and capital, and change nothing about the status quo. The worst part is that they do it thinking they are so edgy for knowing exactly why just another piece of regulation will clearly not work. Funnily enough, the EU tra…
The comedic irony of your personal attack and smug dismissal isn't lost on me.
Let's try to stay focused on the subject matter and leave personal jabs aside.
Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear
#770Earlier quoted context omitted.
this is not about protecting businesses. this is about providing jobs for locals. many african countries are struggling with that. providing an income for everyone is important. keeping everyone satisfied is too. not to mention not loosing your cultural identity. and if the clothing industry is able to provide jobs by keeping cheap low quality products out of the country, why would that be bad? clothing is not the bi…
We have had that in Argentina for 40 years. The result? One of the most expensive countries to live in the world. The PS5 you can buy for 500 dollars in USA? it is 1000 here in Argentina. The Samsung Galaxy you pay 800 in USA? It is 1600 in Argentina. The Levi jean you pay 100? It is 250 in Argentina. Or, if you want to pay the same price for a jean, you can, but the quality will be 1/3 of the one you can buy in USA/…
we are not talking about banning the import of regular products, but about donated or second hand items that are sold for next to nothing, half of which is useless junk. the point is to not allow these inferior imports to undercut local products, not to make any imports more expensive than local ones. the latter happens too, and it's stupid, but just because that is bad, and we should be allowed to sell our products, that doesn't mean that we should also be allowed to dump our junk that we don't want in those countries too.