Is the fashion industry ready for the transition to a caring economy?

The need for wellness is becoming more and more dominant in people’s lives, and so they are embracing new routines around care. During the pandemic, shifting perceptions of what’s important—family, friends, and community—prioritised acquisitions, shopping, and being “on” all the time.

It wasn’t until early February that the world showed solidarity with a little Moroccan boy who fell into a well. The collective global hope for a miracle was felt across Europe, Asia and America.

This sense of community and caring for ourselves and others is driving a new set of products and services that the fashion industry is increasingly embracing. One that recognizes the flexible lifestyle of people who are greater than the sum of their labor. They are increasingly adopting hybrid models to create a better balance between life and work and dress accordingly.

Mobile design, comfortable clothing and flexible lifestyles are driving a changing buying behavior where people strive to be the best version of themselves in terms of wellness, happiness and the home environment.

A caring economy is the future

Joan Tronto, a renowned professor of political science at the University of Minnesota, says the notion that manufacturing and economic life are the most important political and human concerns ignores reality. Instead, caring for ourselves and for others represents the highest value and should therefore form the starting point for business, politics and institutions such as school and family.

Business can create long-term value by producing products and services that meet those needs. A caring economy means an economy that cares about people and the planet. It builds on the concept of caring as defined by Tronto. She understands it as “everything we do to preserve, continue and repair our world so that we can live in it as well as possible. This world includes our body, ourselves and our environment, which we want to weave into a complex, life-sustaining web.”

The numbers support Tronto’s theory: the global wellness industry is expected to reach $7.6 billion by 2030, with cosmetics and personal care accounting for a 24 percent market share take in. Overall growth will increase at a rate of 5.5 percent per year from 2021 to 2030, according to Precedence Research.

This post was previously published on FashionUnited.uk. Translation and editing: Barbara Russ

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