What else do people need to distrust Shein?

In August, the Chinese instant fashion giant suffered two quite serious blows: a German newspaper and the Korean authorities found concentrations of toxic substances in its products that exceeded legal limits. In its short life, Shein has already been the protagonist of such scandals, but its reputation among the general public does not seem to be affected

by Roberto Procaccini

Admittedly, we are guarantors and recognise that the case against the Chinese instant fashion giant is a circumstantial one. But the clues here are not the fateful three that together make a proof. There are many more. Enough to distrust Shein and the industrial system it has set up. Highly efficient from a production and distribution point of view, able to grind out billions upon billions in sales (topped off by resounding profits). However, it is murky and flawed when it comes to consumer, worker, and environmental safety.

The last tiles

At the turn of the summer, the giant of instant fashion, as the production and distribution model that has overtaken the usual fast fashion on the right is defined, was caught out not once but twice. In August, Öko-test, a German newspaper that conducts investigations to protect consumers, bought over twenty products (across product categories and men’s, women’s and children’s collections) to subject them to laboratory investigations. Well, or rather severely, it turned out that two-thirds of the sample failed the tests, showing concentrations of toxic substances at levels well above the legal limits.

Earlier still, the international news reports, the South Korean authorities subjected more than one hundred articles from Shein, as well as Temu and AliExpress (two players in Chinese instant fashion) to analysis: here too, the concentration of toxic substances exceeded the safety thresholds. And not by a little.

The previous

One will say to oneself: ‘What a blow to the reputation! It is impossible to recover. Instead, this is not necessarily the case. Because in the albeit brief history of Shein, which started out in 2008 (under a different name) as a wedding dress portal but only turned into the global moloch of very low-priced fashion at the turn of the 2020 pandemic, it already has ‘specific precedents’, as one would say in the judicial lexicon.

It was in the autumn of 2023 when Greenpeace reported finding chemicals such as phthalates, formaldehyde and nickel in the Chinese brand’s garments in quantities exceeding the limits set by European regulations. It was October 2021, on the other hand, when the Canadian newspaper Marketplace conducted analyses of Shein’s (and others’) garments and accessories in collaboration with the University of Toronto, which were found to be, again, largely outside the scope of consumer safety.

Health, but not only

Up to this point, we have focused, starting with the latest news cases, on the independent laboratories that have questioned the health safety of Shein products. But the dossier, as we know, is broader. It concerns the environmental impact of the activities of the e-commerce portal, which, according to Business of Fashion, is a candidate to be “the most polluting player in the fashion industry”, at least in terms of gas emissions and carbon footprint, not to mention the doubts about the social responsibility of the same colossus, which has been accused in the States of resorting to forced labour by the Uighurs of Xinjiang, or of imposing intolerable conditions of employment on suppliers’ workers, such as 75 hours of work per week.

Be wary of Shein

At Shein, they have every right to defend themselves against the accusations. To publish their own sustainability report. To claim that they ‘work closely with international third-party testing agencies, such as Intertek, SGS, BV and TUV, to carry out regular testing to ensure that suppliers meet our product safety standards’. The word now passes to the consumers. There is no need to waste time explaining why they find the offer of sandals for EUR 7.56 and bags for EUR 4.20 advantageous. One wonders when they will feel that such low prices are not worth their own and others’ safety.

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