“The Hidden Cost of Clothing Overbuying: How Fast Fashion Fuels Waste and What You Can Do"
Clothing overbuying has become one of the most urgent sustainability challenges of our time, with the rise of fast fashion fueling waste, overconsumption, and environmental damage at an unprecedented scale. The average consumer today purchases 60% more clothes than they did 15 years ago but keeps each item only half as long, leading to mountains of fast fashion waste that overwhelm landfills and pollute ecosystems. Globally, more than 92 million tons of textile waste is generated annually, with one truckload of clothes dumped or burned every second, and much of this clothing overbuying is driven by the low prices, poor durability, and constant trend cycles promoted by the fast fashion industry. At first glance, cheap prices appear to make fashion accessible, but in reality, they encourage impulse shopping and overconsumption in fashion, where items are often worn only a handful of times before being discarded. The environmental cost is staggering: the fashion industry is responsible fo...