The holiday shopping season is well underway and regardless of socioeconomic status, political preference, or religious ideologies, there’s nothing as unequivocally American as our annual obsession with fourth-quarter capitalism.
We’re talking 30 dopamine-fueled days of batshit crazy consumer spending. Starting immediately after Thanksgiving in the U.S., Black Friday opens the floodgates for Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday. According to Adobe Digital Insights, total e-commerce sales over the entire Thanksgiving weekend are forecasted to reach $29 billion in the U.S. alone. Given the EPA has estimated shoppers throw away at least 13 million tons of clothes each year and consumers are purchasing five times as much clothing as they did 25 years ago, it seems totally logical that 100 million Americans are lining up to shell out their hard-earned savings for heaps of items that will eventually get discarded, right?
Ironically enough, the term “Black Friday” can be traced back to 1966 when the Philadelphia police department used it as code to describe reprehensible crowds and disruptive traffic conditions on the Friday following Thanksgiving. As the phrase became more widespread, a popular explanation became that this day represented the point in the year when retailers begin to turn a profit, thus going from being “in the red” to being “in the black.” Today, it’s estimated that 130 countries “celebrate” Black Friday in some form or another. Europe, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany all started to adopt Black Friday within the last three to four years. Central and South American countries, China and almost half of Africa are also on board to spend money fast because our global obsession with status is essentially just a never-ending episode of Keeping up with the Kardashians.
Thankfully, there has been some pushback toward this kind of uber-consumption and a new era of ethical shopping known as “conscious” or “considered” consumerism has emerged. We’ve discovered that, through our collective purchasing power, we can create a more equitable economy by spending money empathetically and with intention.
Giving Tuesday, the Tuesday following Cyber Monday, is a “global generosity movement” to rally support for local charities and nonprofits through crowdfunding. Women-Led Wednesday, launched by our badass friends over at Wild Rye, is a brand-new, purpose-driven holiday bringing together a community of like-minded, female-led brands to encourage the general public to “shop women.”
At the same time, we’re seeing a newfound interest in the slow shopping movement. And yes, there’s an app for that, too. We were thrilled to see our inbox was flooded with newsletters dedicated to buying “better,” or simply to buying nothing at all. One of our favorite examples of sticking it to the man was from Noah Clothing: they were closed for the fourth consecutive Black Friday and paid homage to the iconic “Skateboarding is Not a Crime” bumper stickers from Santa Cruz Skateboards with their own iteration “Not Shopping is Not a Crime.”
Ikea’s former Chief Sustainability Officer Steve Howard made headlines by declaring developed nations had “reached peak stuff,” asking consumers to consider how they can pay it forward and close the loop on what they already own by donating or recycling. As part of their Re-Home Your Bag Project, UK-based outfitter Millican is issuing a call to action to send backpacks, regardless of brand, to their headquarters so they can repair them and find them new homes. You can even take your personal brand of snowflake-inspired activism a step further and consider making a matched donation on behalf of your favorite climate-change-denying relative to an environmental charity through Patagonia Action Works this holiday season. And while we’re at it, why don’t we just adopt this mindset as we roll into 2020? New year, new me?
The definition of ‘Conscious Consumer’ is quite subjective. It appears in many forms in academic journals and studies starting all the way back in the ‘70s. Jaya Ramchandani describes it as “an agent of change who considers the social, environmental, ecological, and political impact of their buycott and boycott actions.” On a spiritual level, to be conscious means to be awake or awakened, to see with eyes that are simultaneously open and closed. So, the RANGE team decided to take a long hard look at our own consumption habits. Between climate change and the impending apocalypse, it might be our final days to save…humanity as we know it.
Here is our simple yet effective set of criteria to consider before we add that extra item to our cart:
Buy from local shops and retailers that give back to the community.
Buy from purpose-driven brands that share your values.
Buy from brands that enrich the environment and take responsibility for their actions.
Buy from brands that support diversity and gender equality.
Buy from brands that have fair-trade practices and transparent supply chains.
Buy from brands that make long-lasting, durable products.
XX Jeanine Pesce. Photos by Jules Davies.