Eco Beauty & Fashion

Shop Drop 2015

December 4, 2014 /

illustration of woman against black background with flowers trailing from her handEditor’s Note: Check out the 2016 Shop Drop Challenge!Last year, I discovered that 160 million American women spend an average of $60 each month on clothes, while dumping six pounds of textile waste into the landfill. That’s $10 billion and one billion pounds of trash—every month. I was so floored by those numbers that I started the Shop Drop Challenge and 500 of you joined me, saving an average of $30,000 and 3,000 pounds of waste in just one month. Not bad, right? But more than that, many of you reported that the experience changed the way you thought about shopping—you started buying less, thrifting and swapping more.

This year, when I found out that women spend nearly 190 hours a year shopping and window shopping for clothes and accessories, I realized that time—so precious to all of us—was also at stake here. So I decided to bring the Shop Drop Challenge back for 2015. If you need a New Year’s Resolution that saves time, money and the environment, this one fits the bill. Will you join me?

If you need a New Year’s Resolution that saves time, money and the environment, the Mommy Greenest 2015 Shop Drop Challenge fits the bill. Will you join me? Here’s how it works:

  1. At any time between now and 1.30.15, comment below with your pledge to not buy any new clothes or accessories for yourself* for 30 days.
  1. Swap or thrift to get your fashion fix and still fulfill the challenge.

That’s it! And it can really make a difference. According to Global Fashion Exchange, each year 1.7 billion clothing items go unused in closets across the globe. In terms of the environmental impact of fashion, here are some more facts to consider:

It takes 2,200 gallons of water to produce one pair of jeans—that’s the same as nearly 300 showers.

A plain cotton t-shirt requires 1/3 of a pound of toxic fertilizer to produce.

The textile industry is the world’s second largest water polluter, after agriculture.

95% of the clothes we throw into the landfill are recyclable.

But swapping and thrifting changes that picture considerably. If every woman in America took the Shop Drop Challenge for just 30 days, we could save $10 billion, 2.5 billion hours and one billion pounds of landfill waste—in just 30 days!

Can we top our 2014 numbers? I think so! Please pledge below and join me in the Mommy Greenest 2015 Shop Drop Challenge. Thanks!

1.21.15 Update: To celebrate the last few weeks of the 2015 Shop Drop Challenge, online consignment megastore thredUP is giving away a $500 handbag shopping spree to one lucky Mommy Greenest reader! Simply join the Challenge by commenting your pledge not buy any new clothes for the next 30 days, then enter the giveaway below. That’s it! And of course, if you need to get your fashion fix, thredUP‘s selection of more than 250,000 preloved clothes and accessories is totally acceptable!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*If your kid needs new soccer cleats, who am I to say you can’t buy them until February?

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