Sustainable fashion marketing: green or greenwash?

The marketing of fashion increasingly acknowledges the currency of sustainability as providing a competitive advantage. Arguably, sustainability is increasingly important and has become a mainstay of societal discourse; however, oftentimes fashion-retailers and brands are accused of superficially addressing sustainability rather than integrating sustainable principles into all operational aspects. This chapter will examine critical perspectives of marketing fashion sustainability, including authenticity and the perceived appropriateness of sustainable activity, to question whether fast-fashion can ever be considered sustainable, given the premise of this model is of accelerated fashion-production, consumption and ultimately disposal. This chapter examines the above themes, beginning with the role of fashion-marketing as enticing unsustainability and the current stagnation of locked-in practice that stifles the progression of fashion sustainability, before concluding with examples of authentic sustainable fashion marketing.