Fashion sharing service airCloset aims for zero waste fashion

Japan’s first garment-sharing service company, airCloset, is aiming for zero apparel waste via its business model for sustainable fashion. However, it is not content with that alone. It also plans to work on all the United Nations’ sustainability goals in order to change the current socioeconomics to ones that enrich our hearts.

AirCloset began in February 2015, delivering stylist-recommended outfits to Japanese women for a monthly rental fee. It’s when the company realized what the fashion industry lacked – a sustainable, recycling-based business model.

The online airCloset service now gives women access to more than 100,000 items of clothing that they can wear as many times as they want. When they are done, the garments are passed on to someone else, instead of being thrown away as trash. Sharing the clothes not only allows customers to experiment with various styles and stay up to date with fashion trends, but also to easily change clothing sizes. The company recently expanded its range to include plus sizes up to 3L.

Zero waste fashion

AirCloset says it agrees with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation on the need for a circular economy for fashion. The company is thus committed to offering sustainable business design and service in order to achieve that. What the fashion world needs most right now, it says, is for the entire industry to aim for zero apparel waste.

Although we have prospered materialistically from the socio-economics of mass production, mass consumption and mass waste disposal, airCloset says there are grave doubts over whether it has enriched our souls. It believes that by facing those doubts in our daily lives and creating socioeconomic conditions that we are content to be part of, “we can achieve richness in our hearts as well as in the economy”.

Targeting all 17 SDGs

To do that, airCloset is aligning its actions with the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It’s main, fashion rental service ticks the boxes for goals 8, 9 and 12: promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth; build resilient infrastructure and promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and innovation; sustainable consumption and production.

ShareCloset is another of airCloset’s projects aimed at reducing apparel waste. The company works with specific clothing brands to gather used garments from customers. It subsequently uses airCloset’s experience and techniques to add these garments to the sharing service or recycle them as materials.

Planning for a sustainable future

Among its newer projects, airCloset is working with Shizen Energy Inc. to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by using renewable energy. Those efforts link to SDG goals 7 and 13: ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy; take action to combat climate change.

AirCloset is also creating a charity project called ‘Sustainable Donation,’ which will donate a percentage of the revenue from its business to international social and environmental causes. It sees such continuous support as facilitating sustainability. The company will enable its users to contribute too. With this, it moves towards the first SDG of ending poverty, and the third goal of ensuring healthy lives and well being for all.

Next steps for airCloset

AirCloset is seeking other groups and companies to collaborate on the remainder of the 10 SDGs.

When we each consider what we do for the environment and others, we tend to think about the actions that we take – recycling, cycling instead of driving, choosing organic or handmade products. But by instead focusing on a goal, we can align all our habits with that aim.

AirCloset’s ambition to work on all 17 SDGs reminds us that, although every effort we make helps, there are 17 areas that need to be improved. There’s a lot to be done. Maybe if we all add one new goal to focus on each month, sometime late next year, we’ll find some extra richness in our hearts.