\n<\/p>\n
The Italian authorities have fined Shein \u20ac1m (\u00a3870,000) for making \u201cmisleading or omissive\u201d environmental claims about its products, the second time in as many months the Chinese fashion retailer has been targeted by European regulators.<\/p>\n
Environmental sustainability and social responsibility messages on Shein\u2019s website were in some cases \u201cvague, generic, and\/or overly emphatic\u201d and in others were \u201cmisleading or omissive\u201d, said Italy\u2019s competition authority, AGCM.<\/p>\n
It is the latest criticism to hit the fast fashion behemoth, where shoppers can pick up polyester party dresses for as little as \u00a31.60, leading to claims it is helping to cause a plastic pollution crisis through the oversupply of cheap synthetic clothes.<\/p>\n
Shein details its \u201cevoluSHEIN\u201d roadmap on its website as including three strategic pillars: \u201cEquitable Empowerment (People), Collective Resilience (Planet) and Waste-Less Innovation (Process).\u201d<\/p>\n
But AGCM was critical of its approach. \u201cThe well-known brand, operating in the \u2018fast\u2019 and \u2018superfast fashion\u2019 sectors, adopted a misleading communication strategy regarding the characteristics and environmental impact of its clothing products.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThrough its website \u2026 and other promotional and\/or informational online pages, the company disseminated environmental claims within the sections #SHEINTHEKNOW, evoluSHEIN, and Social Responsibility that were, in some instances, vague, generic, and\/or overly emphatic, and in others, misleading or omissive.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shein\u2019s claims about product circularity and recycling \u201cwere found to be either false or at least confusing\u201d, AGCM said, while its claims that products from its \u201cevoluSHEIN by Design\u201d collection were more sustainable were \u201coverstated\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cMoreover, these claims may lead consumers to believe not only that the evoluSHEIN by Design collection is made solely from \u2018sustainable\u2019 materials, but also that its products are fully recyclable \u2013 a statement which, given the fibres used and current recycling systems, does not reflect reality,\u201d the regulator added.<\/p>\n
The fine was imposed on Infinite Styles Services Co Ltd, a Dublin-based company that operates Shein\u2019s website in Europe. In a statement responding to the ruling, Shein said: \u201cWe have cooperated fully with the AGCM throughout this process, and took immediate action to address the concerns raised as soon as we became aware of them.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have strengthened our internal review processes and improved our website to ensure that all environmental claims are clear, specific, and compliant with regulation.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Italian fine was announced just over a month after France\u2019s directorate for competition, consumer affairs and fraud prevention handed Shein a \u20ac40m penalty for \u201cdeceptive commercial practices\u201d.<\/p>\n
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Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n The French regulator found that Shein had misled consumers about discounts offered to them and was unable to substantiate environmental claims made on its website.<\/p>\n Last month the EU justice commissioner, Michael McGrath, expressed shock at the toxicity and dangers of some goods being sold by Shein and its competitor Temu.<\/p>\n Reuters contributed to this report<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Italian authorities have fined Shein \u20ac1m (\u00a3870,000) for making \u201cmisleading or omissive\u201d environmental claims about its products, the second time in as many months the Chinese fashion retailer has been targeted by European regulators. Environmental sustainability and social responsibility messages on Shein\u2019s website were in some cases \u201cvague, generic, and\/or overly emphatic\u201d and in<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[1891,2599,2861,4397,2670,513,5034],"class_list":{"0":"post-14126","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-claims","9":"tag-environmental","10":"tag-fined","11":"tag-italy","12":"tag-misleading","13":"tag-products","14":"tag-shein"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14126\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}