Romwe may seem relatively new on the fashion scene as it has taken the online shopping world by storm in the last few years, though it has been selling clothes since 2009.
Often seen in advertisements on social media, the huge choice and low price of the clothes make them a favorite brand for customers in America.
How their products are made may not have been considered by shoppers a few years ago, but today more and more customers are considering the environmental impact of their shopping habits.
How a brand manufacturer’s their clothes, the impact this has on the local and global environment, and how the company treats their works, are being looked at more deeply by shoppers who are more eco-conscious.
So how well does Romwe do in these aspects? And can it be considered a fast fashion brand?
Read on to learn all about the often shady business and manufacturing practices of Romwe, and whether you should give up on this particular brand.
What Is Fast Fashion, And Is Romwe A Part Of It?
Fast fashion is known for two things, its cheap prices and its unsustainable practices.
Fast fashion brands are often able to continually pump out thousands of garments a day, which are then sold on various websites or in shops for very little cash.
This has a huge negative impact on the plant, people, and even animals.
Often the clothes made by fast fashion brands are made with cheap and toxic textiles and dyes, and they produce a huge amount of textile waste.
Very often the factories will steal natural resources such as water from the surrounding area, to be used in the manufacture of clothes.
This takes these resources away from the people and animals who need them to survive. When this happens droughts are more likely to occur in the area.
If the water is pumped back into the area, it can be filled with the toxic dyes, chemicals, and microfibers from the factory, causing a lot of harm to the people and animals who then drink the water.
On top of that, another hallmark of a fast fashion brand is how poorly they treat their workers, as many in the factories are not even paid a living wage for their long hours in dangerous conditions.
With all this in mind, we can safely say that Romwe is a fast fashion brand.
Their website is constantly being updated with new clothing items almost every day, the materials they use are very flimsy and bad quality, and their products are usually sold at a very low price to shoppers.
With this in mind let’s take a look at the environmental and ethical issues with Romwe.
How Ethical Is Romwe?
Constantly appearing on lists like ‘top 10 brands to avoid’, it’s easy to see why people don’t trust Romwe.
The company has never made public how they treat their factory workers, how their clothes are made, or how these practices impact the environment.
All this probably implies that they’re a very unethical company.
Romwe is exactly the same as another company – Shein. They both are supplied by the same factories and sell the same clothes at the same price, yet neither has come out to say how these products are made.
Romwe is the only one out of the two companies that have made a pledge that they are “Deeply dedicated to the ethical and humane production of every one of [their] pieces.
We will tolerate nothing less. Every supplier signs a binding letter of agreement to heed to the highest production standards”. The problem is we have no proof as to whether this is true.
Labor Concerns
There are some rumors that Romwe uses sweatshops and child labor to make their clothes, which is sadly a common practice in the fast fashion industry.
On their website, Romwe says that they treat all of their workers fairly by providing “industry-leading” working conditions. But with no proof of this, we can only assume the worst.
Environmental Issues
The environmental impact of Romwe is again something we simply don’t know. They have never released enough information for people to completely understand their supply chain, or how their clothes are manufactured.
Because of this, we cannot tell how bad the environmental impact of the company is, though considering they won’t tell us probably means that it is very harmful.
Fast fashion, in general, is very harmful to the environment as it encourages a throw-a-way culture, meaning shoppers are producing more clothing waste than ever before.
The average American throws away 37kg of clothes or fabric a year, with it all ending up in landfill sites if it’s not recycled.
Clothes made in unsustainable ways are often contaminated with dangerous chemicals and dyes as we have mentioned, so when these clothes begin to break down these are released into the environment causing even more damage.
As a lot of fast fashion clothing is also made of flimsy materials, they can break down after only a few wears meaning that customers then have to buy replacement items, contributing to textile waste and their carbon footprint through the transportation of these items.
Should I Stop Shopping At Romwe?
Yes, 100%. We cannot say enough how much you should avoid this brand or even Shein for that matter.
Customers have a right to know what they’re buying and how the products are made, so they can make an informed decision about whether they actually want to buy from the brand.
Romwe is hiding way too much from shoppers and that can only be a bad thing.
Yes, it might be cheap, but if you don’t even know what you’re paying for then it really isn’t worth it.
