Does The Collective Abandoning Of Luxury Goods Leave The Fur Industry In Decline?

Designers and fur companies are not so worried.

On the two day, another luxury head brand announced that the team was "abandoned".

The army, this time, is John Galliano, creative director of Maison Margiela. He made a decision after communicating with Dan Mathews, vice president of PETA.

The anti fur team in the fashion industry is still strong. In the past two years, the voice brand has been dozens of dozens of brands, ranging from Michael Kors, Furla, Gucci, Jimmy Choo to Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Tommy, retailer and electricity supplier.

"Do not wear real fur" seems to have become.

The political correctness of the community, and the support of LGBT, resistance to zero model, anti aggression, support the women's rights become the main representative of the brand to show responsibility for the society.

In addition to the appeal of the animal protection association, in the policy level, some countries have also issued a ban on fur sales and the closure of mink farms.

For example, the West Hollywood, Berkeley and old Jinshan in the United States have banned fur trade; Amsterdam is also preparing to issue related injunctions;

Norway and Holland, Europe's largest fur producing area, are also shutting down fur farms.

With the expansion of anti natural fur ideas, the Western fur market has declined since 2012.

Data from the International Fur Association show that in 2015, Germany, Russia and the United States

Sales did not exceed $1 billion 500 million.

It seems that the fur industry has been weakened in the West.

But it really means fur.

Will this decline?

Kopenhagen Fur

JUN JIE

JUN JIE

Big thunder and little rain?

Designers may be the ones who have the most personal feelings.

In the past, fur was more dependent on brand positioning than it was.

As for the creative director's personal preferences, the supply of fur has always been unstable. With the change of fashion trend, the choice of fur is also affected by the year and season.

Yang Junjie is the new face of Shanghai fashion week this year. Although only two of his clothes are fur, fur is the fist product of his personal brand, JUN JIE.

In the fur storm, Yang Junjie has some experience: "last year Rihanna wore my fire fur, and at that time, many people attacked me on Instagram."

Later, Wu Yifan also wanted him to order a fur, but was stopped by the broker, and finally chose only some fur jacket.

This is because, as long as animals are concerned, the voice of public opinion may be very controversial. Getting the "humane way" is always the focus of public opinion against fur.

Although the European fur breeding Association launched the "Welfur" animal welfare program in 2009, it has standardized four aspects of housing, feeding, behavior and health in mink farming.

The Copenhagen fur company's breeding base is also selected in Denmark, the world's largest mink producer. In fact, the company is owned by 1600 local mink breeders.

But fur production outside Europe is still unable to guarantee the humanity of fur.

According to the Global Times quoted the southern weekend, more than half of the respondents in the random interviews had seen live skins and animal farm videos.

On the international fashion week, the anti fur people often hold pictures of bloodstained animals peeling corpses in protest, or repeatedly sing the screams of peeling when holding trumpets.

These protests focus on animal welfare, and the international fur trade association CEO Mark Oaten has also said that China's fur farms are often exposed to animal abuse videos because of inadequate supervision, and this problem is likely to be widespread.

But in Yang Junjie's eyes, fur's controversial material may not lose its voice in the western market.

This is because the main positions that are "Besieged" by animal protection organizations are often the most influential platforms in the fashion industry, which can not immediately draw a line from the global fur products.

For example, Yang Junjie plans to continue the fashion show in the next quarter in New York. This is a decision to build the brand. "Now I want to play the brand awareness. New York fashion week is a good platform. I want to release new products there and then go back to Shanghai to make a reproduction show."

In fact, the development trend of fur market is still vigorous, and the age of consumer groups has a downward trend.

Copenhagen fur company, which supplies raw materials to Yang Junjie, is also the world's largest fur auction house. Its president of China, Cui Yiyun, said in an interview with the interface that the collective boycott of luxury fur has not yet had a substantial impact on the industry.

On the contrary, because of its topic characteristics, it is very easy to resist fur as a marketing tool for fashion brands.

Otherwise, the practice of anti fur can not be called genuine goodwill.

At present, the massive abandonment of fur has not shaken the foundation of this industry.

According to the statistics of the International Fur Association, the proportion of fur brands in the 2018 autumn and winter fashion week is still as high as 64%.

"It's easy for you to expand the small probability event to the probability rate event. After several successive brands say that they have abandoned the fur, we have predicted that the fur will be withdrawn from the stage of history."

Cui Yiyun said.

Animal protection groups are protesting loudly every year around the venue of the international fashion week.

(photo source: buro247)

Mink farming farm in Denmark (Kopenhagen Fur)

Gradually submerged support.

The fur industry may be caught in the "spiral of silence" - the opposition is growing, and the support side is afraid to make a noise.

Even in the fashion world, the editor in chief of the American Edition Vogue Anna Wintour and the French version of Vogue Carine Roitfeld have expressed high support for natural fur, but people often remember the gossip about Wintour throwing animals in the show.

The reason why they support natural fur is clear. This is an environmentally friendly material that can be degraded within a month. The main ingredients are water, protein, fat and inorganic salts.

The production process is also mainly carried out on farms, with carbon emissions less than 20% to 30% of man-made fibers.

Mink bone powder, fat and other body parts are used in central heating, manufacturing biodiesel and other fields.

The proper use of natural fur is also related to natural balance. Nancy Daigneault, vice president of the International Fur Association, once said: "if we don't use it, fur is still there."

There are plenty of Fox and coyote in some parts of North America, so as long as hunting scale meets government standards, it will not affect the survival and continuity of animal groups.

In fact, if there were no artificial arrests to reduce the number of these predators, the number of rare animals such as American cranes would be reduced accordingly.

Meanwhile, Wang Yi, chief representative of China fur International Association, added that the recycling of fur industry is more perfect.

Although the durability of natural fur is usually more than 30 years, the specialized fur retail outlets in Northeast China will have specialized recycling and renovation departments.

There are not many people who can really understand this fact.

The voice of fur industry is always closed, or blame the industry itself.

Cui Yiyun acknowledged that as the most important source of fur industry chain, Copenhagen fur and industry insiders and brands communicate more, and failed to achieve effective communication at the consumer side.

"Fur is not a necessity for people's lives, and our voice is not big enough. When they communicate with consumers, they already have a predominant impression of fur."

Founded in 1949, the International Fur Association is also one of the most important organizations in the fur industry. Currently, there are 50 countries in the world.

In addition to specifying trade rules and industry norms for fur trade, they will also shoulder some responsibility for vocalization.

However, according to Wang Yi, people in the industry are more exposed to daily work, and the communication with consumers is not thorough enough.

From the grass-roots level, many of the employees are at the weak end of social communication.

Cui Yiyun said that most of the employees in the fur industry are farmers and lack the resources and capabilities of publicity and marketing.

In China, most of the production and processing enterprises of fur are farmers' owners of private identity, so there is also lack of awareness and financial resources for communication.

Therefore, Copenhagen fur now wants to voice through young designers. "Now we will cooperate with many young designers, so that they can form a correct understanding from the early fur material, and then convey it to the young consumers."

Cui Yiyun said.

Yang Junjie is one of the collaborating designers. Fur's innovation is the new way he wants to open up.

"If conditions permit, I will use fur in the two quarters of spring, summer, autumn and winter, mainly because the amount of material used and the process will be different," he said. "In spring and summer, the thin mink can be cut geometrically and combined with plucent fabrics. Finally, it will be like a mink in the air."

Poor voice and poor performance will not only affect the image of the industry, but also cause pressure on the employees.

Karl Largerfeld once expressed this concern to the New York Times: "it is easy to say no fur, but it is an industry. If we resist the fur industry, who will pay for the unemployed?"

At present, there are about 1 million professional fur traders in the International Fur Association.

According to the statistics of China Leather Association, China's fur professional practitioners have reached 5 million people.

According to Wang Yi, China is already the second largest prairie material production area after Europe, and is also the largest fur retail market and largest processing market.

Therefore, as an international industry with mature industry chain, the survival of fur market is related to the future direction of many practitioners.

At present, finding a balance point in the negative social media and employment responsibilities of fur is not easy, but some people have already searched for many alternatives, such as mixing genuine and fake fur, or making pure artificial fur appear more and more in fashion design.

Nowadays, Stella McCartney, Miu Miu, Ralph Lauren, Hugo Boss, H&M and Topshop are all keen on the use of artificial fur.

As the industry grew, an Faux Fur Institute was also created in 2016. Arnaud Brunois, the founder of the organization, said that in 2017, nearly 220 brands of artificial fur were introduced in the new series launched by the fashion industry, and some brands were mixed with genuine and fake products.

The existence of artificial fur also helps consumers reduce the threshold.

Although Yang Junjie is also an advocate of natural fur, but as a new brand, he has chosen some fur for his commercial fur.

"I think artificial and natural must grasp both hands. Before I have established a perfect brand image, I must have a reason to persuade others to buy it."

But in fact, artificial fur can not solve the problem of natural fur, but may bring new environmental pollution.

At the beginning of this year, the International Fur Association released a 94 second video.

The main content is to introduce how to extract chemicals from fossil fuels, make nylon and polyester fibers to produce artificial fur, and then have a negative impact on the environment.

Fendi 2018 holiday series

Fur business is still growing in China.

Therefore, it is more important to go into the bottom and advance the pparency and pformation and innovation of fur industry, and to gain access to the channels and methods of fur.

After all, there is still a real demand for fur products in the world. For the inhabitants of northern Europe, Russia and Northeast China, fur is the most practical. Its warmth and durability are well received by consumers. Sander Jacobsen, executive vice president of animal health and public affairs of Copenhagen fur company, has said so.

China's fur business was indeed at its most vigorous stage 5 years ago, but its sales declined after 2014 because of factors such as anti-corruption and awareness of animal protection.

"In the last few years, when the market was good, the fur was broken. Tens of millions of people went in. The environment was bad this year.

In order to mortgage bank loans, his family has sold several factories, and has closed one or two shops, but the capital still can not turn around.

Mr. Yao is the fur shop owner of a leather city in Haining, he said in an interview.

Since 2014, his family's business has been sharply reduced, forcing the family business to lay off and close down.

Because fur is a global industry, China will also be affected when the international market is bad.

Wang Yi introduced that fur was pported to the Chinese market after being produced in Europe and then sold to Russia, Europe and the Americas.

At the same time, fur from global processing will also be sold to China for sale.

In the past two years, the price of mink and fox fur has been falling, resulting in the price of Chinese fur products being reduced.

However, as Chinese consumers are keen on fur, the Chinese market is still showing an overall growth trend.

According to the latest report of South China Morning Post, even in Hongkong, consumers have strong desire to buy light fur.

The International Fur Association also expects luxury consumers to regard fur as a status symbol in big cities like Beijing and Shanghai.

Therefore, more than 95% of Copenhagen's fur export products are sold to Asia, especially China, which is the main customer of most large fur factories in Denmark.

According to the latest and most complete data provided by the International Fur Trade Association (IFF), the total retail sales of leather in China in 2015 amounted to 16 billion 900 million US dollars, ten times more than that in Germany or the United States, and these two have become the main consumer market of fur.

Jacobsen certainly has a positive attitude towards the sustained growth of China's fur industry. "In the past ten years, the retail industry has been growing. Considering the good social and economic factors at present, we have no reason not to believe this kind of growth will continue."

But it is important to note that IFF CEO Mark Oaten has also put forward a point that can not be overlooked: the decisions made by brands such as Gucci have really affected China's moral choice, because, like Western consumers, Chinese consumers are also sensitive to ten points of decision-making in the major Western fashion houses.