International Competition: Innovative Companies, and Sustainable and Ethical Fashion Brands

As the emerging trends of using innovative technology and sustainable actions are gaining attention, we expect these companies to rule over the market in future by adapting to changing demands of the customers. Being non-famous or start-up companies, these brands have gained increasing popularity among customers and are working towards expanding themselves overseas, thus, becoming a big competition for other companies.

Innovative International Companies

1. Shape ways: The company gives consumers the opportunity to create their own unique products using additive manufacturing. 3D printers provide a rapid and cost-effective way to create custom items based on CAD (Computer Aided Design) files, which can be sent to Shape ways and turned into a finished piece.
2. Unmade: London-based manufacturing platform Unmade – which also works with Far fetch – has a different model: customized knitwear created within hours. The team has hacked industrial knitting machines so bespoke designs can be produced at the same cost as making thousands of identical pieces. It has partnered with brands including Opening Ceremony and Christopher Ræburn to let its customers digitally customize their purchases.
3. Eileen Fisher: US-based designer Eileen Fisher has been using $180, 000 (£ 136, 000) Shima Seiki 3D-knitting machines to save yarn wastage, but at New York’s National Retail Federation show in April, the women’s clothing brand demonstrated a customer-facing version, created with Intel, designed to be used for customization. Using this machine, a bespoke garment can be created in 45 minutes.
4. Michelle Tinsley, Intel’s director of mobility and secure payments, says that made-to-order can help retailers track inventory, which will stop them from discounting the “trillion-dollar problem”: over-ordering. Performance brand Ministry of Supply also uses the Shima Seiki knitting machine in its Boston store to offer personalized blazers on demand.
5. Adidas: This brand is bringing 3D-printed shoes to the masses. The brand has partnered with the startup Carbon — which uses a photosensitive resin that hardens as light hits it — to create the sneakers. This process is much quicker than anything that has been trialed in sneaker-making before, reducing the time it takes to make a sole from 90 to 20 minutes.
6. H&M: This company has a garment recollection system, where people can take the clothes and home textiles they do not plan to use anymore. The collected garments will be sorted into three categories: rewear (sold after at second-hand stores), reused (turned into new products like cleaning cloths) and recycle (turned into textile fibres to use in new products). “H&M was the first brand to launch this initiative at a full scale, with garment-collecting boxes in all stores around the world”.

International Sustainable and Ethical Fashion Brands

1. Everlane: This online apparel brand professes to create high-quality clothing through ethical processes. The company has also made its pricing completely transparent so that customers know what they're paying for. It's resonating well with customers in 2015, its sales were estimated to be $35 million, up 200% from 2013. In 2016, the brand reportedly brought in another $51 million, all the while solely selling its clothing online.
2. JW PEI: Not only are JW PEI's vegan bags stylish, but they're conscientiously crafted from recycled bottles. Not all vegan leather is created equal (synthetics often contain harmful chemicals), but JW PEI says they're committed to not only being cruelty-free, but waste-free too — no pesticides are used in producing their synthetic fibres, nor is any water used for dyeing. Currently, their bags are made from over 50 per cent recycled bottles, (their linings are now 100 per cent recycled), and their goal in the next two years is to replace major materials with those that are 100 per cent recycled.
3. Nudie Jeans: They manufacture all of their product with 100% organic cotton (using 91% less water than traditional methods in the process), they pay everyone in their supply chain a living wage, they recycle and resell second-hand garments, and they perform unannounced checks on their factories and suppliers to make sure everyone is keeping to their high standards – and they even publish these reports online for everyone to see.
4. Jungmaven: Designed and produced in Los Angeles, Jungmaven is an ethical clothing brand with one basic objective at its core: hemp. More environmentally friendly than traditional fabrics like cotton, hemp is a wonder-plant in more ways. Than one, requiring less water to grow and absorbing carbon back into the earth, helping to regenerate soil. In its fight to promote the plant, Jungmaven produces a wide range of 100% hemp garments alongside several hemp-cotton blend pieces for those of us still transitioning to the hemp life.
5. Planet Guests: This brand focuses on local, sustainable, vegan, and handmade clothing and accessories. Many items, including the Brina loafer, are ecologically-constructed with zero carbon-dioxide emissions.
6. Westland Jewelry: All Westland jewelry is cast in 100 percent recycled metal, which comes from post-consumer products, such as already existing jewelry, electronics, and hardware. The company uses only recycled or fair-trade diamonds and gemstones, is a 100 percent vegan brand, and uses socially responsible production methods.