Ethical Issues in the Fast Fashion Industry

Chi Sheh¹, Peng Chan², Wen Jun Sim¹
(1. University of the West, USA; 2. California State University-Fullerton, USA)

Abstract: Fast fashion is becoming more and more popular nowadays and this industry is growing rapidly. In order to supply to the big demand of fast fashion clothing, company will need to increase the production of the clothing in shorter time frame. Besides that, to out beat the competitor, company will provide more choices of clothing in cheaper price to the customers. By practicing these actions to increase the business profits, company is behaving unethical to the manufacturer of the cloth. Most consumers are not aware of these ethical issues. This paper is will used and tested the conceptual model of fast fashion business ethics based on literature reviews. The finding from this paper will manifest the “real cost” of a cheap and branded fast fashion clothing and will be supported by real life event that happened. However, after realizing the problems, some company did make some changes and the solutions are stated in the paper as well.

Key words: fast fashion; business ethics; corporate social responsibility

JEL codes: I18, L21, M14