OPINION: Influencers Don’t Need Fashion Brands
“See you tomorrow!”
“Done.”
“Very demure…”
“...Heyyyy”
“This is what this looks like on, meee”
The internet loves to circulate a bit – and the most successful influencers know a memorable hook for content can be the key to their success online. Jools LeBron was already creating content and had hundreds of thousands of followers, but one video using the phrase “very cutesy, very demure” blew her following off the charts and gave her brand deals with giant companies like Zillow, Verizon, and Lyft.
Before content creation was monetized, sharing life online was just an accepted cringey rite of passage for our youth. (I.e. the good days when there was no shame in posting whatever stupid picture you wanted. This is a safe space – I miss it too.) As social media and influencer affiliate marketing have exploded, it’s no surprise that influencers identified a money market to tap into besides view counts - selling to their followers. Certain content creators are making a shocking amount of money through brand partnerships and dropping their own merchandise. It’s reported that Alix Earle makes $450,000 per sponsored Instagram Story and Brandon Edelman made $768,000 in 2024 from posting online.
Why would brands shell out such staggering amounts of money? Because content creators have power. When someone creates an online community, there is influence and power from popularity amongst the masses. Brand deals, merchandise, attendance to celebrity events, all amassing into more and more clout and usually, monetary benefits. With such power, comes responsibility in regards to environmental impact from their influence.
We’ve seen it all on the internet - and I won’t deny that the responsibility must be overwhelming for some influencers. Everything they say, do, wear, buy, travel to is scrutinized and analyzed. It must be tiring. (Not as tiring as a minimum wage job or working for a non-profit, or busting ass to pay rent in America, but you know what I mean). Despite the pressure, I don’t think it’s wrong to hold content creators to a high standard. Their actions have consequences when there is buying power influence – when influencers say to buy, a lot do. Deals that platform sustainable brands, eco-friendly products, recycled and vintage clothing would seem to have positive consequences. But when a huge creator makes a video to share their newest partnership with Walmart or Shein, it’s honestly quite disappointing. (Note: there are many families in America who truly could not survive if it wasn’t for the cheaper goods that Walmart provides. But that’s a different conversation).
It’s not new information that the fashion industry is responsible for a staggering amount of waste each year. 92 million tons of clothing is discarded every year. 92 tons is equivalent to over 200,000 pounds. Multiply it by a million, and that’s the unfathomable amount of waste from clothing alone.
Despite the devastating effects of such waste being widely known and acknowledged, why do influencers continue to accept brand deals from SHEIN, Fashion Nova, and other fast fashion giants? Is a check going to shield them when the earth is cracked open and burning?
The Cycle Begins
There is a lot of beauty in creating a community online – including diversification of perspective from interaction with others around the world and the jokes and bits that happen along the way. I love seeing good people thrive online, and I –like many others– have several comfort influencers I religously watch. I’ve watched some of them long enough to see them make the same shocking, impactful, and harmful decision.
Because how do you justify creating a whole fast fashion company to sell to your fans?
Artwork by Morelli
If accepting brand deals from widely acknowledged, harmful fashion companies is minus 100 in good Karma, a terrible fate is in store for influencers starting their own brands and having a direct line of responsibility for items joining the soul-crushing cycle of textile waste.
I wish that influencers had a better track record for creating their lines and for the clothing to be thoughtful, beautiful, sustainable, and ethical in design and production. This just so rarely happens. More often than not, I go onto a site to check out a launch, and the clothing looks fine - but the ‘Ethical manufacturing’ page is wrought with unbelievable greenwashed jargon.
Madeline White - See You Tomorrow
I have been a fan of Madeline White’s for years now. She’s funny, smart, creative, and has a sharp eye destined to design. When I watched her brand, See You Tomorrow, have several failed launches for her product, I was more than bummed. The first launch in May of 2024 missed what White’s personal brand had been – creative, loud, and unapologetically authentic – with the lowest price point for pajamas at $134 USD for 100% polyester. White immediately faced backlash from consumers, despite garnering over half a million site views. Customers reported that the price point for 100% polyester items was absurd, and using “fast fashion materials and selling at a high end price was wild”. White, after receiving a plethora of feedback from her fanbase, decided to quietly close the site and put her brand on hold while reevaluating the mess.
How did the launch go so poorly? White drew up the designs to then send off to another piece of the production line to produce and sew, leaving herself in the dark. White also stated that she didn’t think consumers would be as savvy and be invested in which fabric the garments were made of. When questions and negative comments started pouring in, White said she had a lot of the same questions about price point in regards to items and quality, leading her to make the decision to take a pause and rethink the issues with See You Tomorrow.
The second launch of See You Tomorrow in December of 2024 saw expanded sizing and reduced prices with change of production team, manufacturer, and materials, but missed a portion of quality check. Resulting in improperly crafted pieces sent to customers, White received an influx of criticism and anger online. Although warranted, the specific creator causing the trending videos did appear to relish in the attention from hating on another content creator and brand. The last brand-damaging error? The factory mislabeled the materials used for a pricey $148 USD silk chemise, printing 92% viscose instead of 92% silk on the care tags. White addressed the misprint in a TikTok explaining that it was a mistake that got overlooked from several rounds off checks.
Despite the errors, what was most surprising of all? White is a talented seamstress with a creative mind. I’ve watched her sew her own dress to a premiere, gowns for her bridesmaids, and other outfits she’s DIY’ed or upscaled in a few hours for various events. She really is incredible. So what is she doing creating items on her iPad to then be sewn and produced from across the world? It feels disingenuous to her brand. Maybe White was just presented with her dream to be a fashion designer with her own brand, and ran with it.
On the See You Tomorrow website, the mission page shows two paragraphs on ethical manufacturing and sustainable practices that focus on fair wages and small batch production. While ‘covering all it’s bases’ the page doesn’t give much compelling information or detail. Though well intended, the page lacks actual hands on knowledge and familiarity with the employees and factories themselves in Columbia and Indonesia. There are steps that could be taken to make this feel more real. Having photos of the hands and faces sewing the clothing would be a good start.
I’m empathetic to the experience that White has endured with See You Tomorrow over the past year. The embarrassment that must have come from 3 failed launch attempts has taken resilience and maturity to take accountability for – she’s handled it with her chin up with several apology and explanation videos. As a fan of Madeline White, I wish we could have seen her talent more on display with dedicated drops of gorgeous clothing she herself hand made, instead of going the tired, well trodden, disappointing fast fashion track. She’s a creative at heart, and I’m holding out hope we see a line from her in the future that’s applaudable of her talent.