WSJ: A Shirt's Tale

[kingkv23]

As a beginner I found this recent article in the WSJ to be helpful.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126349588317829071.html

 

[Master Squirrel]

Great article!

I also like stories about what happens to clothes when we no longer want them.

http://www.heraldextra.com/lifestyle...b8fd79f53.html

sahsi paws through a garbage bag full of unsorted rags. He pulls out mint-condition khaki Dockers, "This pant is too BIG!" he exclaims. "No obese people in Africa! Nobody wants over size 38."

Ralph Lauren Polo slacks, stained. "No style!" Sahsi says. Africans want five-pocket pants, hip huggers, bell bottoms. "Poor people are kind of fashionable," he says. "Modern girls! This is true all over the world."

Cotton sweater. "No money! Two washes and it goes. Stretched out." He'll sell it as shoddy, 1 cent a pound, to be shredded for fibers in Panipat, an Indian city clattering with 400 old Italian recycling mills.

Black scoop-neck top. "Black people don't like to wear black clothes. It doesn't look good."

White cotton T-shirt with purple Curves logo. "Wipers." Fifteen cents a pound, to be cut into wiping rags.

Shoes bring up to 90 cents a pound, but no high heels, no canvas, no heavy leather.

Yellow turtleneck. Flannel shirt. Too hot for Africa. "Garbage!"

 

[kingkv23]

Very informative; hopefully my old clothes are Grade A. haha!

 

[Syl]

I enjoy articles like this. Thanks.

 

[Nataku]

Interesting. I always like to donate stuff and see if I come across it in the thrift again. I wonder if that's really the case, that roughly 50% of the donations go overseas, sight unseen by US thrift workers. You'd think with how greedy thrift store managers are nowadays, they'd comb through just about every bag to find that cast-off Chanel dress or that silk Gucci jacket.