As someone who has worked hard to bootstrap Care What You Wear the first sustainable fashion directory, I’ve found myself facing the very frustrations I aim to help consumers avoid. Despite having an insider’s knowledge of the sustainable fashion landscape, I still struggle with the customer experience. And as I reflect on this, it’s clear to me, and others when asked, that customer service and accessibility are areas where many sustainable brands have fallen short. If the industry is serious about competing with fast fashion and creating a mass-scale impact, these issues need to be addressed.
The recent experience I had with a sustainable fashion brand highlighted this disparity. I ordered three items, totalling around £200, and was prepared for potential additional import taxes—but the £75 tax I was charged was a shock. This experience left me wondering: Do customers have to lower their expectations to support ethical, sustainable fashion? And if so, is that a sacrifice people are willing to make?
Customer Expectations in the Age of Fast Fashion
It’s no secret that fast fashion giants like SHEIN and Temu have perfected customer service. From their smooth ordering process to generous return policies, they make it easy for consumers to shop without hassle. Fast fashion buyers, many of whom are women around the age of 35, spend approximately £100 per month on average. This is a key demographic that sustainable brands need to capture. But can sustainable brands compete on both price and customer service while still maintaining their values?
It’s a tough balance. Fast fashion offers low prices and great service, but the environmental cost is high. Sustainable fashion, on the other hand, often charges more—sometimes much more—without necessarily providing a superior shopping experience. If a customer is paying £100 for one shirt instead of ten fast fashion items, they should receive a luxury experience. Luxury and care should be built into the service.
For me, a luxury experience in this case would have meant:
Providing an estimate on taxes and fees upfront, before I completed the checkout process.
Creating a system where customers aren’t taxed at nearly 50% of their purchase price.
Delivering the products in beautiful, thoughtful, and sustainable packaging that reflects the brand’s ethics.
Making the international shipping process clear, or better yet, forming partnerships with countries to cover import taxes for customers upfront.
Accessibility: The Critical Problem
Despite knowing the ins and outs of sustainable brands, I’ve found it difficult to shop sustainably. If I’m encountering these obstacles, I can only imagine how daunting it is for consumers who are new to the movement. The problem is accessibility—sustainable fashion still isn’t as easy to navigate as fast fashion, and customers can quickly get frustrated by unexpected costs and poor service.
At Care What You Wear, we’ve tried to address some of these barriers by labeling brands by country. This allows consumers to shop more confidently, knowing that they won’t face unexpected import taxes. However, there’s still work to be done. We also want to identify brands with the best international shipping deals, so customers can shop without worrying about hitting these financial hurdles.
For customers, time is money. The time it takes to resolve shipping or tax issues detracts from their experience and may lead them to abandon sustainable shopping altogether. Many people want to support sustainability, but they also work hard for their money, and the extra costs and time can quickly add up.
The Future of Sustainable Fashion: Striking the Balance
If sustainable fashion brands want to capture a wider market, they need to take notes from the successful business models of fast fashion while maintaining their values. We don’t want customers leaning away from sustainable options because of frustrating processes that should be seamless.
In my case, the brand had told me to expect emails from one shipping carrier, but a different carrier contacted me instead. As a result, I missed those important emails since they didn’t land in my inbox. These small, seemingly trivial issues add up, causing unnecessary frustration. If I weren’t invested in seeing the experience through, I could easily see how this would drive customers to ask for a refund instead of sticking with the purchase.
Ultimately, we need sustainable brands to succeed. To do that, they must deliver not only quality products but a top-tier customer experience that matches the higher price point. We’re not here to ask customers to settle for less—we’re here to help sustainable brands navigate the incredible challenge of competing with fast fashion for buyers. By improving accessibility and customer service, we can shift more consumers away from fast fashion and toward a more sustainable future.
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