《经济学人》：快时尚报复性消费能维持多久呢？

原文标题：

Fast fashion

A pretty picture

But for how long?

Fast fashion is in party mode

Next up: the inevitable hangover

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“For the last two months it has been busy like the weekend every day,” sighs a sales assistant at a large Zara store on Tauentzienstrasse, a shopping street in the centre of Berlin. On the Tuesday after the long Pentecost weekend about a dozen ladies were queuing for the fitting room, each carrying several items, many of them in hot pink or canary yellow, colours en vogue this season. They don’t seem to be deterred by Zara’s higher garment prices. At least not yet.

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Shoppers are still “revenge buying” to make up for all the time when shops were closed and socialising banned amid waves of covid-19. After grafting pajama bottoms onto their legs over the past two years, buyers are snapping up office and party wear. On June 8th Inditex, which own Zara, Bershka and Massimo Dutti, among other brands, reported glittery results for its latest quarter. Revenues rose by 36% year on year, to €6.7bn ($7.2bn), surpassing levels before the pandemic. Net profit jumped by 80% year on year. Online sales dipped compared with the same period in 2021, when the internet was the only place to shop for clothes owing to lockdowns in America and Europe.

But the decline of 6% was much slower than expected, which suggests that people have got used to buying garb on the internet. In another boost, China is reopening after the latest bout of lockdowns. Only four of Inditex’s Chinese outlets remain closed, down from 67 in the three months to April. h&m, Inditex’s Swedish fast-fashion rival, is expected to report similarly perky results on June 15th.

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The big question for Óscar García Maceiras, who took over as chief executive of Inditex in November, and his opposite numbers at other fast-fashion firms, is whether the party can last. The short answer is that it probably won’t. But if anyone can keep it going for a bit longer, it is Inditex. As Georgina Johanan of JPMorgan Chase, a bank, notes, the Spanish giant looks best-placed to withstand the combined pressures of war, competition, inflation and, possibly, recession.

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Start with the problems. Fast-fashion firms had to put a complete halt to their operations in Russia and Ukraine after Vladimir Putin invaded his southern neighbour in February. Inditex, which has more than 500 shops in Russia, derived 8.5% of its operating profit from the country in 2021. This year it has had to make a €216m provision for the estimated cost of the war to its Ukrainian and Russian businesses.

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Beyond eastern Europe, fashion retailers are being squeezed by competition from Shein, an online-only challenger from China that has sashayed into Western wardrobes in the past few years. And then there is the twin “stagflationary” challenge of higher costs and flagging demand. This is acute for clothes pedlars, since many of their customers have already replenished their closets—and a new pair of trousers is a less urgent need than energy, food and rent, all of which have been getting pricier.

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No fast-fashion house is immune to these forces. But with the exception of the Russia-Ukraine war, Inditex does look less vulnerable than the others. Shein, whose items sell for an average of $20 or so, poses less of a direct threat to the Spanish company’s mid-market frocks, which go for just under $40 at Zara, according to estimates by Anne Critchlow of Société Générale, a bank. In recent years Inditex has also done a better job than its rivals of unifying its online operations with its more than 6,000 shops around the world, thanks to clever radio-frequency trackers, an in-house digital platform and a group-wide inventory database.

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Crucially, Inditex enjoys one more advantage over rivals when it comes to inventory, the management of which is particularly important in times of stagflation. The company produces around two-thirds of its items in Europe or in nearby north Africa and Turkey. That allows it to adjust output more quickly in response to demand than firms like h&m, which sources 80% of its clothes from Asia. In a slowdown it pays to be faster in fast fashion.

（恭喜读完，本篇英语词汇量约766左右）

原文出自：2022年6月11日《The Economist》Business版块。

精读笔记来源于：自由英语之路

本文翻译整理：Fei Min

本文编辑校对: Irene仅供个人英语学习交流使用。

【补充资料】 （来自于网络）

五旬节，天主教礼仪年规定，每年复活节后第50日为“圣神降临节”，又称“五旬节”(最初是犹太人的重要节日)。圣神降临节为复活节后第七个星期日。新约圣经中说，耶稣复活后第40天*天升**，第50天“差遣”圣神降临。当时，圣母和门徒们在晚餐中祈祷，天主圣神借“猛风的声、火舌的形”降临。宗徒们领受了圣神，开始传教，标志着教会时代拉开帷幕。圣神降临节是天主教十分重要的节日，经常被看作是仅次于复活节的节日。

印地纺集团Inditex，来自于西班牙的世界四大时装零售集团之一（其它三个为美国的休闲时装巨头GAP、瑞典的时装巨头H&M、荷兰的平价服装连锁巨头C&A）。近年来凭借旗下ZARA的风靡流行与全球扩张，逐渐超越H&M、GAP等时装零售巨头，成为世界最大的时装集团公司。Inditex旗下拥有ZARA、Pull and Bear、Massimo Dutti、Bershka、Stradivarius、Oysho、Uterque、ZARA HOME八大服装品牌，ZARA是其中最成功的，被认为是欧洲最具研究价值的品牌之一。2020年8月10日，Inditex公司名列2020年《财富》世界500强排行榜第398位。

H&M是Erling Persson于1947年在瑞典创立的服装品牌。位于瑞典市Stora Gatan大街的老H&M店是世界上第一家H&M专卖店。H&M品牌名是由“Hennes” （瑞典语中“她”的意思） 女装与“Mauritz”男装品牌合并，各取第一个字母而成“H&M”。如今，H&M在全世界1500 多个专卖店销售服装、配饰与化妆品。2020年7月28日，H&M名列福布斯2020全球品牌价值100强第76位。

SHEIN希音，电子商务应用。中国跨境电商巨头。是一家国际 B2C 快时尚电子商务公司。主要经营女装，但也提供男装、童装、饰品、鞋、包等时尚用品。截至2021年5月17日，SHEIN是54个国家和地区中排名第一的iOS购物应用程序。SheIn由于主打欧美市场，加上创始人团队鲜少露面，SHEIN很少出现在公众视野和媒体报道中。最近，SHEIN以“中国最神秘独角兽公司”身份引发关注，源于其被多家媒体报道正在进行新一轮融资，投后估值或达1000亿美元（折合人民币约6666亿元）。

停滞性通货膨胀（英文：stagflation），简称滞胀或停滞性通胀，在经济学、特别是宏观经济学中，特指经济停滞，失业及通货膨胀同时持续高涨的经济现象。通俗地说就是指物价上升，但经济停滞不前。它是通货膨胀长期发展的结果。

【重点句子】 （3个）

They don’t seem to be deterred by Zara’s higher garment prices.

她们并没有被Zara的涨价吓退。

In another boost, China is reopening after the latest bout of lockdowns.

另一个促进因素是，最新一轮*锁封**结束后，中国正在重新开放。

No fast-fashion house is immune to these forces. But Inditex does look less vulnerable than the others.

没有哪家快时尚品牌能幸免于难。但相比其他品牌，印地纺的确承受力更强。

自由英语之路