Last updated on November 13, 2024
Recently, SHEIN, a Chinese fast fashion company boasting 32.5 billion dollars in revenue in 2023 (according to Business of Apps), has been called out online for its questionable labor practices and negative environmental impact. While the company uses TikTok to advertise their products, the same app has been the platform for viral videos displaying “Help Me” and other alarming messages written on SHEIN clothing tags (according to Independent).
While SHEIN sells many types and styles of clothing, even branching out to sell makeup, appliances, and other home goods, their crocheted products may shine a light on the reality of their unfair labor practices. Unlike knitwear, crochet garments cannot be recreated by a machine (according to CrochetThat), so every crochet item, whether sold by SHEIN or small indie merchants, must be handmade.
Crocheted shawls on Etsy (a platform for small business owners to sell their goods) go for as much as 200 dollars, whereas SHEIN offers a crochet cover up shawl for $11.51. This particular design appears to be made up of around 40 granny squares stitched together. An experienced crocheter recreated just one of these squares in 11 minutes. So, to make all 40 squares, it would take around 7 hours and 20 minutes. This does not include the time to stitch the squares together into a complete garment.
According to the US Department of Labor, the federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour, although certain states have higher minimum wages (such as California, at $16 an hour, according to the California Department of Industrial Relations). At the US minimum, the labor costs to create this shawl would be at least 53 dollars. At the California minimum, it would cost over 117 dollars. Neither of these estimates include the cost of materials, fixed costs, or shipping.
Even by cutting costs on materials, there’s no way to offer such a low price while still paying fair wages. According to Freedom United, some cotton used in SHEIN’s products has been traced to the Uyghur region of China, where the forced labor of religious and ethnic minorities is allegedly common. According to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, at least 80,000 Uyghurs (members of a certain ethnic minority) may have been forced to work in factories across China. While these factories have ties to some Western companies (notably Apple and Nike), there is no direct evidence that SHEIN utilizes forced labor. However, slave labor would likely explain SHEIN’s ridiculously low prices. Even if SHEIN is paying their employees, whatever wage they offer is far too low and not enough to live off of.
Despite all this evidence of abuse and possible genocide, 88.8 million people bought from SHEIN in 2023, including 17.3 million Americans (according to Business of Apps). As consumers, every purchase we make is a vote of support. By purchasing from SHEIN, American buyers are supporting unfair labor practices or, worse, modern-day slavery. While some have argued that buying from SHEIN and other fast fashion companies is the only affordable way for many people to purchase clothing (obviously, 200-dollar handmade shawls aren’t budget-friendly for the majority of Americans), thrift stores offer second-hand clothes for prices similar to SHEIN’s while minimizing textile waste and pollution.
The ease of online shopping is so important to the average American consumer that they’re willing to turn a blind eye to SHEIN’s labor malpractice and potential modern-day slavery. SHEIN’s success is reliant on America’s culture of overconsumption and self-obsession. How many help notes must be written, how many photos of grimy factories must be leaked, and how many reports of forced labor must be released before Americans put others’ lives over their personal convenience?
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