What the Shein-Everlane deal tells us about the value of sustainable storytelling

Two more unlikely bedfellows are hard to imagine.

When Everlane was founded in 2010, it positioned itself as a more ethical type of fashion business, even trademarking the phrase ‘radical transparency’. Shein, on the other hand, has a reputation for being one of fashion’s biggest polluters.

To a lot of people, this acquisition is proof that sustainability doesn’t have value any more in fashion - customers don’t care and don’t support more environmentally friendly businesses over any other. If they did, then Everlane wouldn’t be in this position.

Whether Everlane was ever a ‘truly’ sustainable business is one part of the picture. For most consumers, buying sustainable fashion is an act of trust and it has become easy for some brands to erode this through greenwashing.

But Everlane was very good at telling its sustainability story to consumers. And Shein isn’t blind to the power of this.

Caption - Image credit: Jack Stratten/Insider Trends

What exactly is Shein buying with its acquisition of Everlane?

As much as we’d like it to be the case, it seems unlikely that Shein bought Everlane because it wants to make its giant existing business more sustainable and believes Everlane has a network and insights that it can use to do that.

Although a statement by Everlane CEO Alfred Chang about the acquisition talks about “entering this next phase with expanded global reach, new capabilities, and greater opportunities to bring our mission and products to more customers around the world”, we’re also not sure this is about Shein using its supply chain and manufacturing might to supercharge Everlane’s sustainable manufacturing capabilities. 

It also doesn’t currently sound as though Everlane is just going to become a brand name on Shein’s website designed to increase its appeal among Millennial consumers who feel a bit guilty about buying fast fashion. In his statement, Chang said that Everlane would remain "an independent brand, staying true to our longstanding brand values, sustainability commitments, and exceptional quality."

Caption - Image credit: Insider Trends

Put aside the difference in sustainability positioning for a second and actually this deal doesn’t seem quite so out of left field. Ultimately, both Shein and Everlane are DTC fashion businesses that have some physical retail presence.

What made the acquisition so surprising is the gap between Everlane’s sustainability reputation and Shein’s low quality, mass volume business model. And maybe Shein sees value in the PR power of that.

Because even if sustainability supposedly doesn’t matter to consumers, Everlane still has a recognisable story. Sustainability is a fundamental part of the brand - the first thing you think of when you hear the name. Its concept of radical transparency - telling consumers where their clothes were made, how much they cost to produce and what they were made from - resonated because it was easy to understand and different from what nearly every other fashion company was doing at the time. 

For Shein, which is constantly under fire for its environmental impact, Everlane’s reputation provides a PR cushion. It helps to legitimise Shein - something that Shein has also been doing with shop-in-shops in BHV sites in France - and makes it seem like a more credible operation.

This may not even be for the benefit of consumers. Increasingly it’s regulators and investors and governments that Shein is having to win over as environmental legislation tightens. Everlane could be a shield to hold up when criticism is levelled against the bigger business. 

Caption - Image credit: Jack Stratten/Insider Trends

Is the value in the action or the story?

Shein may have bought Everlane to improve its image. But Everlane’s own sustainability image has taken a knock in recent years from complaints of racism, criticism of greenwashing, and accusations of union-busting through layoffs.

The brand was also struggling under $90 million of debt, which is suggested to be the reason for the sale to Shein (reportedly for $100 million).

Under these circumstances, can Everlane improve Shein’s image among sustainability-sensitive shoppers? Or will Shein’s ownership erode Everlane’s positioning further? 

It may depend on whether the conscious consumerism story that Everlane told was more valuable than how well that story translated into genuine action. And the answer may come from outside Shein or Everlane. 

Original Everlane co-founder Michael Preysman, who left the company’s board last year, responded to the acquisition news with a new website called stillradical.com that suggests he is starting over with a new apparel brand.

Details are scarce on his plans but the stillradical homepage has a few insights, stating that it will be the “same principles, but a new take. And this time: no venture capital, no private equity.”

Whatever Preysman’s new brand looks like, it will be launching into a radically different market than Everlane did in 2010. A market where sustainability is a tough market proposition on its own as consumers are first and foremost desire and price driven.

Although maybe they always were. And it was in all three of those areas that Everlane succeeded.

It’s easy to forget that once upon a time Everlane was desirable. It had a 80,000 strong waitlist for its launch T-shirt with an inventory of just 1,500. And these giant waitlists were seen time and again for different launches - nearly 30,000 for Everlane underwear, over 44,000 for its denim collection.

People had the choice of buying elsewhere - some probably did - but thousands still wanted to wait for their chance to buy an Everlane item. Because of the radical transparency approach to showing what it actually cost to make products, consumers also felt they were getting a good deal for the quality of the end garment compared to buying elsewhere. 

But what was behind this desirability? Did Everlane really become desirable because its products were sustainable and that’s what people wanted? Or did it become desirable because someone told a good story about what it was doing, people kept sharing that story, and people wanted to be part of it?

At the time of writing, over 78,000 people have signed up for more information at stillradical.com - numbers that are eerily close to the original Everlane waitlist. Are they all potential customers? Probably not.

But they all want to know what the next chapter is going to be, which suggests there is still value in sustainability if you know how to tell the right story.