The European Union is set to prohibit large fashion brands from burning or destroying unsold clothing and footwear from 19 July 2026 onwards. Retailers will be required to reuse, recycle, resell or donate leftover stock instead. Medium companies follow in 2030. Will this actually cut textile waste in Europe, or will the biggest players sidestep the rules?
Bran37 on
I am surprised it didn’t cross my mind that this happens
Alarmed_Crazy_6620 on
Should all retailers be banned from destroying any of their merchandise?
GobiPLX on
All hope for big promotions, I don’t need the newest collection, I’m fine with old stock
Siffi1112 on
Okay whats stopping companies from shipping it outside the EU and destroying it there?
uusrikas on
I guess the unintended consequence will be smaller batches of products with higher prices and less unusual or ambitious design, companies will just make stuff that is safe and sells
No-Strawberry7 on
what do you mean destroy?
snoozemaster on
Is it only brands or private people also?
We tried banning this for all citizens here in Sweden and it was a disaster.
lambentLadybird on
That is insane. Here the same stock is in the store and discounted more and more until it’s sold. What little remains, they put away and bring back for the next sales.
I’m talking about large chains.
Why they don’t do the same in another countries?
johnybgoat on
Ooo i did a small presentation about this topic awhile ago. Long story short for those who don’t know, fashion brands outright destroy and burn most of their older article they no longer want for one reason or another instead of just donating it for the „poor peasants“ to potentially wear and „damage their brand“
soymilo_ on
They’ll just add a new „restocking “ fee on every returned item and that money will be used to offset the costs to ship it as a „donation“ to a non-EU country to get it destroyed there. May as well file a tax return claim on these donations. They haven’t gotten so big by being stupid
spezial_ed on
Now do the same for food
jlandero on
It never ceases to amaze me how ignorant people are about the end of life of mass-produced products.
Sometimes I really feel like people think that their trash disappears after the trash bin is collected.
gorion on
If „recycle“ is an option, then how destruction is banned?
Warranty_V0id on
And they will find a loophole where the fashion companies sell each other the clothes for a fraction of a cent per piece and destroy them afterwards.
FlamingoMission3852 on
I would agree with this, if they are obliged to sell/donate to eu countries or at least countries with environmental accords. Otherwise nothing changes
VegetableOriginal492 on
How much environmental damage does destruction of clothes cause? Would be interesting to see actual estimates.
ZrapeToid on
Here in Sweden a new law made it illegal to trash clothes.
This caused clothes donation bins to overflow, plastic bags of clothes piling up beside it.
It’s a nice idea, but we have a lot of clothes as is, we don’t need to save all of it.
therealdilbert on
so instead they will be donated to poor countries in e.g. Africa destroying the local industry, one of the few industries that still require manual labor and thus has often been the a countrys first step towards getting out of powerty
GongTzu on
They will put it on the ships that are going to be disassembled in India. They will always find a way to move the problem, not solve it.
ICEGRILLZ666 on
Big companies will just sell everything which was supposed to be destroyed to Africa, where the clothes will end up in a landfill or polluting the seas
3esper on
We should do food next. Too much waste we can’t afford anymore.
BigReference1xx on
Just a reminder of that time when Gibson drove a digger over 500 thousand dollars worth of brand new guitars, rather than donating them to charity or selling them at a discount:
27 Kommentare
The European Union is set to prohibit large fashion brands from burning or destroying unsold clothing and footwear from 19 July 2026 onwards. Retailers will be required to reuse, recycle, resell or donate leftover stock instead. Medium companies follow in 2030. Will this actually cut textile waste in Europe, or will the biggest players sidestep the rules?
I am surprised it didn’t cross my mind that this happens
Should all retailers be banned from destroying any of their merchandise?
All hope for big promotions, I don’t need the newest collection, I’m fine with old stock
Okay whats stopping companies from shipping it outside the EU and destroying it there?
I guess the unintended consequence will be smaller batches of products with higher prices and less unusual or ambitious design, companies will just make stuff that is safe and sells
what do you mean destroy?
Is it only brands or private people also?
We tried banning this for all citizens here in Sweden and it was a disaster.
That is insane. Here the same stock is in the store and discounted more and more until it’s sold. What little remains, they put away and bring back for the next sales.
I’m talking about large chains.
Why they don’t do the same in another countries?
Ooo i did a small presentation about this topic awhile ago. Long story short for those who don’t know, fashion brands outright destroy and burn most of their older article they no longer want for one reason or another instead of just donating it for the „poor peasants“ to potentially wear and „damage their brand“
They’ll just add a new „restocking “ fee on every returned item and that money will be used to offset the costs to ship it as a „donation“ to a non-EU country to get it destroyed there. May as well file a tax return claim on these donations. They haven’t gotten so big by being stupid
Now do the same for food
It never ceases to amaze me how ignorant people are about the end of life of mass-produced products.
Sometimes I really feel like people think that their trash disappears after the trash bin is collected.
If „recycle“ is an option, then how destruction is banned?
And they will find a loophole where the fashion companies sell each other the clothes for a fraction of a cent per piece and destroy them afterwards.
I would agree with this, if they are obliged to sell/donate to eu countries or at least countries with environmental accords. Otherwise nothing changes
How much environmental damage does destruction of clothes cause? Would be interesting to see actual estimates.
Here in Sweden a new law made it illegal to trash clothes.
This caused clothes donation bins to overflow, plastic bags of clothes piling up beside it.
It’s a nice idea, but we have a lot of clothes as is, we don’t need to save all of it.
so instead they will be donated to poor countries in e.g. Africa destroying the local industry, one of the few industries that still require manual labor and thus has often been the a countrys first step towards getting out of powerty
They will put it on the ships that are going to be disassembled in India. They will always find a way to move the problem, not solve it.
Big companies will just sell everything which was supposed to be destroyed to Africa, where the clothes will end up in a landfill or polluting the seas
We should do food next. Too much waste we can’t afford anymore.
Just a reminder of that time when Gibson drove a digger over 500 thousand dollars worth of brand new guitars, rather than donating them to charity or selling them at a discount:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd7ySopIwog](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd7ySopIwog)
They will just sell it to the different country without ban and destroy it there.
So they are going to black-export them to Malaysia or Indonesia, together with plastic bottles?
How very clean.
Don’t ban it. Tax it to oblivion.
If you ban it, they’ll just do something dumb like turn them into rags and sell them with window cleaning products or something ridiculous.
Literally fine them so hard that they think better of not just selling or donating them as perfectly serviceable, intact clothing.
My guess everything will be limited edition they will produce half and twice the price and then no waste