A Cow Ate My Cell Phone!

The saying that your past can affect your future has never been more evident within the world as it is now. As resources are being deplenished, researchers are studying multiple ecosystems and developing new concepts to implement in order to preserve what is left of our natural resources. Within retailing industries, many of these new concepts are being discovered in order to change products from having a cradle-to-grave lifecycle to having a cradle-to-cradle lifecycle. Meaning, that once a product has served its initial service and is discarded it will be biodegradable.

The video Rhoener Textiles discusses biodegradability in-depth breaking it into in two forms of metabolisms: biological and technological. When a product is considered to be a biological metabolism, it can be broken down after its initial use into biological nutrients through different microorganisms and animals relatively quickly. If a product is considered to be a technological metabolism, it can be broken down into technical nutrients and recycled into different forms of technology using its different pieces. This concept of categorizing products was developed by researchers, William McDonough and Michael Braungart and is further discussed in their book, Cradle to Cradle.

In this book, McDonough and Braungart provide creative ways to develop products to be biodegradable as well as reasons why it would benefit consumers and businesses to adopt these products. One particular chapter entitled “Waste=Food,” discusses how all product’s lifecycles should be developed to have no waste. Where every piece of the product can be recycled in some format, whether it is by nature or by technical use. Other researchers have began to develop products based off these concepts, such as Je-Hyun Kim, featured on inhabitat.com in the article The Biodegradable Grass Cell Phone, by Mike Chino. Chino discusses Kim’s new invention of a cell phone made of grass that “automatically biodegrades” after two years, about the same length of most cell phone contracts.

My concept for the future stimulates from this idea, where technology will be produced to live for a certain amount of time and then be disassembled into the two different metabolisms, biological and technological. Instead of using plastic shells for the outer protection of items, such as cell phones and televisions, producers will use certain biological nutrients, such as plants like grass or weeds. They will then cover the metal pieces with a protective coating as to not contaminate the biological nutrients and when the items service is finished they will be able to upcycle the product by returning it to the manufacturer. The manufacturer will be able to toss the outer-shell as it is considered a product of consumption and take the technical nutrients and reuse them in a new product. My concept for the future will also require new laws to be placed into affect, where retailers will not necessarily have to buy back the product, but will have to give the consumer a type of incentive, such as a discounted price on the new product they purchase, similar to trade-ins at car dealerships today. As much as these new laws seem as though they might hurt retailers, they would actually benefit them by assisting them in building long-term customer relationships.

In conclusion, I expect that the future will still hold many hi-tech items; they will just have been modified to be more biodegradable. I also think in order to motivate large corporations to adopt new sustainable ideas, there will have to be certain laws put in place, while to motivate consumers to recycle, laws might be required, but incentives may be applied as well. 

A Comparative Advantage?

Without media displaying multiple images defining fashion and top designers for a particular season, would consumers be more influenced by their community’s perception of fashion? Would they shop local designers instead of foreign brands? Would this assist in limiting the environmental issue of mass consumption? As a nation, we take pride in our individualist culture and strive to be unique; yet our clothing consumption habits might prove otherwise. We often form our opinions of popular fashions for each season from different forms of media based off the styles of others globally. This subsequently leads us to feel as though we are distinct in fashion, when we are actually very generic. The article Local and Light, by K. Fletcher, states that as multiple global retailers begin to mass-produce these generic garments for our consumption, they produce more then what is needed wasting natural resources and polluting the environment. Fletcher suggests the idea of shopping locally, explaining that this would allow for less generic clothing as it would be based around fashion within our community and history, while making the production process more sustainable.

Fletcher’s idea is developed from the biomimicry principle, by scientist Janine Benyus, called shopping locally. Benyus’s principle describes how animals in the environment cannot import products from other places. She also discusses that there is a drive for a globally, borderless economy where one product is built in several nations and sold in a completely different nation. This inspired one of my concepts for the apparel industry, which would be based around consumers shopping locally, but still desiring certain garments made from materials that may not be found within their general region. Although Benyus discusses that products are solely manufactured locally, I do not believe that it is completely sustainable for certain crops to be grown in certain areas that are not natural for their growth, nor do I believe that our country will ever prohibit foreign trade. This is why my concept would incorporate the idea of comparative advantage, which defined by Investopedia.com is when one country, individual, company or region can produce a good at a lower opportunity cost than a competitor, meaning if America could produce cotton more sustainably than India; they would grow cotton and India would grow a different crop. All countries and regions would take comparative advantage into consideration and develop an agreement as to where a product would grow most sustainably and as to how the product should be traded among nations. This would allow for consumers to shop locally purchasing items that are in fashion for their area, but would also allow them a diverse selection of materials.

Along with the principle of shopping locally, this concept was also inspired by Benyus’s principle “Diversify and Cooperate to Fully Use the Habitat.” In this principle, she describes how animals have “agreements” with one another and at times their cooperation can be seen as partnerships that are formed to benefit each other to survive within their habitat. In my concept, the countries have an agreement with each other as to where it is more sustainable to grow a particular crop based off of comparative advantage. They also cooperate with one another by trading these crops in order to make different textiles. From there, the crops are sold throughout different regions in order for the locally owned retailers to develop garments that their niches will purchase.

In conclusion, my concept discusses how comparative advantage, agreements, and trade could affect our nation in the future as we diversify and cooperate with other countries to fully use the habitat and begin to shop locally. As sciences develop more synthetic materials that are sustainable, such as those discussed by B. Quinn in Textile Futures: Fashion, Design and Technology, more agreements and policies will need to be created to trade these materials and their secrets that explain how to develop these textiles in order for the countries to cooperate with one another efficiently. 

Virtual Retailing

With the growing trend of the “green movement” and the concern for our planet, every industry is looking to develop new innovative ways to be sustainable. As businesses search for new ideas, they must first develop a vision of what they think the future might hold for the company.

A sustainable idea for the apparel industry retailers could be, to develop stores that are more virtual. In this store, they would have one garment displayed for each item giving the customer an idea of how the fabric feels. This item would be paired in an area with other garments that would allow for the customer to form ideas of different outfits. Next to these sections there would be a small podium with a type of computer system similar to an iPad. When a customer wanted to examine what a garment might look like on their body style, they would enter their dimensions, etc. into this system, where the system would then pull up a picture a virtual character with similar dimensions to the customer wearing the garment. This would allow the customer to have some kind of idea as to how the garment would fit them. When the customer decided they were ready to checkout, they would locate an employee. The employees for the stores would be walking around with an electronic scanner, where they would then follow the customer and scan all of the items for their purchase and proceed to place their order. The customer would pay for the items through the scanner and would then have the receipt sent to them through e-mail. If the customer preferred to use a different medium of payment, there would be an area where the employee could register the scanner and place the customers order through a standard cash register. Once the order was placed, it would then be sent to the nearest distribution center where the garment would be made and sent to the customer.

In the book Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by nature, the author, Janine Benyus, gives a list of ten principles that could inspire sustainable business practice ideas through nature. A couple of these principles could be used to support the concept of this retail store. One principle is the concept of “using materials sparingly.” Benyus explains that in nature organisms build to fit what they need at the time that they need it and they do not overbuild. I feel as though this principle supports this retail concept because this would allow for the retailer to not make an excess amount of clothes that will end up not selling. Using this system, the garments are made to order allowing the retailer to know an exact number of how much they need.

Another principle Benyus discusses is not to foul our nests. This principle states that in nature, organisms take care of their space and do not clutter it, as this is where they eat, sleep, and live. I feel like this principle supports this retail concept because this would allow for the sales floor and storage area of the store to not be cluttered. If the garments are “made to order” there would be no reason for the retailer to have a bunch of clutter in the backroom of their store. This would also make it easier for the consumers to shop, as there would not be so much clutter on the table causing the store to not become so messy.

All of these principles can inspire amazing ideas for sustainable practice in different industries; it is just a matter of the company wanting to make a change.