NEW YORK — Jeans giant Levi Strauss & Co., casual wear chain Uniqlo and budget retailer Primark are some of the apparel companies hoping to encourage Generation Z to mend used clothing rather than discard them completely.
Levi’s created a hand-stitching course for high school students after determining that many Gen Zers lacked the sewing skills to match their interest in thrift store shopping and sustainability.
The company’s Wear Longer program builds on the repair and customization services Levi’s offers at hundreds of stores worldwide.
“We think it’s important to empower the people who buy our clothes with the skill sets to maintain them, to get them to that second life,” Paul Dillinger, Levi’s head of global design innovation, said.
Mending is a tiny part of cutting the world’s mountains of textile waste, which includes manufacturing remnants, unwanted clothes and unsold products.
The fashion industry as a whole has come under intensifying pressure to reduce its contributions to environmental pollution and climate change.
Researchers broadly agree that repairing and reselling clothes can reduce a garment’s environmental impact, especially if it delays or replaces a new purchase. But many caution the practices remain too limited to offset continued growth in clothing production and consumption.
Clothing production roughly doubled between 2000 and 2015, while the average number of wearings per garment declined by about 36 percent, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. The sustainability nonprofit estimated that less than 1 percent of discarded clothing material got recycled into new apparel.
Whether due to limited budgets or rejecting materialism, Gen Z has helped the pre-owned clothing market grow much faster than retail apparel sales in the US, independent market intelligence firm GlobalData estimated in a report with resale platform ThredUp.
For companies that make new clothes, mending classes address “some deeper consumer needs and consumer behaviors at the moment,” GlobalData retail analyst Neil Saunders said.
Skeptics say the environmental impact of retailer repairs is limited.
The hands-on response from mass-market retailers, especially fast-fashion chains like Primark and Zara, has generated interest as well as skepticism.
Zara launched a digital platform in 2022 for customers to resell their used pieces and to request basic alterations and repairs. The program is available in 17 of the nearly 100 countries where the trend-driven retailer operates.
Ireland-based Primark has focused more on customer education. The value-focused retailer hosts free “Love It For Longer” events where customers are taught skills like replacing zippers and buttons.
“Learning how to repair and care for clothing is probably one of the most simplest but absolutely totally effective ways that we can reduce waste and also extend the lifetime of whatever we buy,” Vicki Swain, Primark’s product longevity and partnership lead, said.
Swain argues that affordable clothes can be just as durable and repair-worthy as more expensive ones. Half the items Primark sells annually are basics like socks, underwear, T-shirts and jeans, she said.
“There is nothing throw away about our products,” Swain said.
Uniqlo offers a range of aftercare services, including repairs, decorative sashiko mending, embroidery and creative restyling.
Available in 75 of the Japanese mass-market retailer’s roughly 2,500 stores, the services are promoted as a natural extension of product life cycles. The program also strengthens Uniqlo’s connection with customers, said Jean-Emmanuel Shein, director of global corporate responsibility at Uniqlo USA.
Kate Fletcher, a professor of sustainability, design and fashion systems at England’s Manchester Metropolitan University, said she thinks popular retailers are well-meaning, but she doubts their repair initiatives will have much environmental impact.
“The fashion sector’s primary source of impact is due to the overproduction of pieces and growing volumes of garments created,” Fletcher said. “Repairing a garment in store happens in addition to these growing production volumes, not instead of them.”
