Do Materialism And Empowerment Influence Slow Fashion Consumption? Evidence From Brazil

The clothing industry, driven by fast fashion, is based on unsustainability and its impacts affects both the environment and people. Such issues have sparked global interest in sustainable fashion consumption through the lens of the slow fashion movement. In relation to empowerment, this can be understood as a way of thinking outside the systems that shape an individual, such as fast fashion. We argue that this scenario would allow individuals to empower themselves through more sustainable consumption choices, that would be the slow fashion consumption. Like materialistic consumers, those who are fashion-oriented acquire more goods and buy and spend more. We consider that slow fashion, however, moves away from trends by valuing high-quality and durable clothing, in less quantity. Thus, given that slow fashion develops a comprehensive understanding of sustainable fashion and it is little explored in academia, this study aims to analyze the influence of empowerment and materialism on slow fashion consumption. We consider that empowerment positively influences slow fashion consumption while materialism negatively influences it. A survey was conducted, and we tested the research hypotheses on a sample of 306 clothing consumers from Fortaleza, the 5th largest Brazilian city and capital of the State of Ceará, which ranks fifth in the Brazilian Textile and Apparel Chain Billing Ranking. In order to analyze the data, we used the techniques of Exploratory Factor Analysis and Multiple Linear Regression. We used the factors of slow fashion consumption as dependent variables and the factors of empowerment and materialism as independent variables. We also tested the effects of respondents’ profiles on slow fashion consumption. We found that empowerment has a positive influence on slow fashion consumption. A highlighted finding was the influence of all factors of empowerment on functionality, suggesting that empowered individuals tend to orient their clothing consumption according to their concerns with the versatility and durability of the pieces. It was also verified that they demonstrate a favorable tendency towards slow fashion consumption due to the positive influence on the orientations equity, authenticity and localism. On the other hand, materialism affects positively only the slow fashion orientation exclusivity. We emphasize that there was not sufficient empirical support to confirm the hypothesis that materialism negatively influences slow fashion consumption, considering that the negative influence was only towards one orientation (localism). Thus, the results allowed the proposition of a conceptual model, involving all relations found between the factors of the three constructs. Regarding the respondents’ profiles, we verified that income has a negative influence on slow fashion and that women and older people tend to be more prone to this type of consumption. This study contributes to the construction of theoretical and empirical knowledge about slow fashion, from its association with constructs such as empowerment and materialism, resulting in the proposition of a conceptual model. The managerial implications, therefore, are related to how strategies of empowerment can be incorporated by slow fashion companies into their marketing programs, such as more active consumer involvement in product co-creation processes.