Hey, Quick Question: Why Are So Many Indie Darlings Collaborating With Fast-Fashion Brands?
Welcome to our column, "Hey, Quick Question," where we investigate seemingly random happenings in the fashion and beauty industries.
Collaborations are a time-honored way to create buzz-worthy moments for fashion brands. Popularized by retailers like Target and H&M in the late '00s and '10s, they offer customers a more affordable entry point to a designer label, and companies the opportunity to surprise them with unexpected, limited-edition pairings. However, these kinds of partnerships have been reaching new extremes, with indie industry darlings linking arms with even the most controversial of fast-fashion giants.
In mid-July, Monse and Shein announced a collection "where luxury meets accessibility and impact." Ranging in price from $1.70 to $64.39, the collection features the New York-based brand's deconstructed, menswear-inspired silhouettes. However, the announcement was met with criticism across social media, with some users expressing frustration with Monse, founded and designed by Oscar de la Renta's Laura Kim and Fernando Garcia, for working with a company with shady labor practices and a mounting environmental impact. (The launch also included a donation to nonprofit Dress for Success.)
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Just one day later, womenswear label Sea announced a childrenswear collaboration with Zara, which has been working to distance itself from fast fashion and instead position itself as more of a luxury brand. The ready-to-wear pieces, accessories and shoes are priced between $17.90 and $99.90, with Sea co-founders Sean Monahan and Monica Paolini taking to Instagram to share how the goal was to "bring our whimsy-filled, vintage-inspired vision to a new audience, both big and small." Other small designer Zara has collaborated with in recent years include TwoJeys, Ader Error and Studio Nicholson.
H&M, which has (similarly to Zara) done significant work to distance itself from fast fashion by promoting its many sustainability initiatives, has also been ramping up collaborations with smaller, buzzier names. In April, it launched one with emerging London-based label Rokh. A month prior, it launched the first drop of a long-term partnership with New York men's designer Heron Preston.
Of course, high-low collaborations are a proven retail phenomenon within fashion. What's different now is how the "high" end of this formula is increasingly made up of smaller designer brands. The appeal of these partnerships is obvious, at least according to Jeanine Polizzi, an assistant professor at LIM College's Marcuse School of Graduate Studies, puts it: "These [mass] brands have a global audience, where these smaller luxury brands might not."
Courtney Bagtazo, senior product developer at New York-based brand development company Stateless, looks at this recent trend from a cost and production perspective: Luxury brands produce smaller quantities with expensive materials to be sold at higher price points, while fast-fashion manufacturers turn out higher volumes using cheaper materials to be sold at lower price points. The former "actually aren't able to access a lower price point without over-producing," she says, "so that's a huge incentive, especially in today's climate where there's a lot of clothing brands out there... With the current shopping climate being that a lot of expensive things are moving slower than they once did, having that accessible price point allows for product to actually get into the hands of consumers in a new format."
These collaborations can also expose these high-end brands to new shoppers who could eventually become customers at their full price point. Bagtazo remembers buying the Rodarte x Target collection when it launched in her 20s; now, she buys the main line. "It was like planting a seed for the younger generation, that's where their price point is at," she says. "You can grow into that as a customer in your high-end price point down the line. It takes a while, obviously, but that's an organic growth."
Photo: Courtesy of Zara
Of course, fast-fashion brands stand to gain a lot from working with indie luxury players, too: They can elevate their own status and convey a more high-end appearance, in addition to offering a new creative perspective, according to Evan Polivy, Stateless' chief strategy officer and director of brand development. It's the little guys that face greater potential drawbacks.
"There is a little bit of risk of their reputation in making these kinds of partnerships," Polivy says. "There's a lot of negative connotations around them. But maybe it's worth the risk for these particular smaller luxury brands because they don't necessarily have the ability to sell items at lower price points."
In a retail climate where small businesses are struggling financially and facing higher costs and increasing competition, forging a collaboration with a bigger name that expands a brand's reach — without straying from its ethos — can be tricky. Messaging, then, in the face of potential pushback, becomes crucial.
"As someone that does help brands navigate these things, I think it is really important to know your brand and know your brand's story and know, of course, the skeletons in the closet and address them head on," Callia Hargrove, founder of brand consultancy Backstory, says. She looks to J.Crew's recent capsule collaboration with Maryam Nassir Zadeh as an example of a partnership that "felt like a natural collaboration and the ethics were aligned."
Fashion is, famously, an expensive industry, but the widening price gap for consumers — a $5 garment from a fast-fashion retailer compared to a $300 not-fast-fashion one, for example — has become more noticeable. And while many shoppers (especially younger ones) might vocalize support for more conscious spending, Polizzi says that expressed values don't always translate to real-life practice.
"Our spending habits dictate otherwise," she argues. "At least in the U.S., we're the most vocal about [conscious consumption] and we're the least active about it."
Polizzi also notes that "consumers are not that loyal as to where they buy their products." This also isn't a totally new trend — consumers have been gravitating toward "branded, yet less expensive version[s] of a brand that they like" as far back as the '80s.
Though she anticipates a day will come where consumers tire of collaborations (at least the types we're seeing today), she predicts these partnerships between fast-fashion and luxury brands won't disappear anytime soon. Hargrove, meanwhile, sees them as "a step in the right direction."
"In the past, we've seen a lot of these fast-fashion retailers rip off small businesses," she points out. "I hope that them wanting to work directly with small businesses is a step of taking ownership of past harms and wanting to do things differently in the future."
