Is Love Island and eBay TV’s hottest new couple?
The newest contestants on Love Island 2022 (Image courtesy: ITV)
We take a look at the newest season of Love Island and their very own shock recoupling, dumping fast fashion and getting into bed with eBay.
We talk about how these new dynamics will work and how it will affect the rest of the fashion world. What does this mean for the newly dumped fast fashion, will they be able to bounce back? Did Love Island make the right choice to recouple? Will there be the return of white jeans? We hope not.
Summer is officially here! Well for some of us at least, I am currently sitting in my university halls while it rains outside :’)
The lucky few that are already lapping up the sun I’m talking about are the Love Island 2022 cast, obviously, a group of young singletons in Majorca looking for love along with a 50 grand prize fund. There is no denying that Love Island is one of the biggest shows on telly at the moment, with episodes reaching three million views each, there are a lot of eyes on the show. However, with a lot of eyes comes a lot of opinions.
In recent years Love Island has partnered with fast fashion brands such as I Saw It First, which is under the BooHoo group, to provide clothing for the islanders to wear in every situation they find themselves in. As a result partnered brands saw an increase in sales, 67% specifically. However, viewers were disappointed in the use of fast fashion in the villa, with one viewer tweeting, “I hate that Love Island is just an extended advert for fast fashion #LoveIsland”. I think it is safe to say that we all know the issues with fast fashion, so the responses were no surprise and were overall warranted.
However this is no longer the case, as of 2022 Love Island has ditched fast fashion and have instead partnered with eBay, the UK’s biggest resale platform. Islanders will now have all of their clothes sourced from eBay sellers, (not including swimwear, underwear, accessories and shoes) all pre-loved and all unique. The eBay and ITV team worked with celebrity stylist Amy Bannerman to curate the wardrobe of pre-loved dreams, even the islanders were involved. (Side note! Surprisingly, not a single boy in the villa wanted white skinny jeans, we’re still fully expecting for them to resurface though, I mean come on, it’s Love Island…)
The way it works is simple, all the clothes are put into one big shared wardrobe for all the islanders to wear, along with a seamstress on hand for alterations, the clothes are intended to be shared by everyone. Amy Bannerman stated “we want nothing to go to waste and we want the clothing to really stand out in the show”, logistically this plan seems to work, the islanders will be seen in pre-loved clothes but also seen re-wearing the clothes that other islanders have already worn. Once the show has ended the clothes are given back to eBay and re-sold on Go Thrift or donated to charities that eBay partners with, once again, to minimise waste. However, the eBay concept does pose some threats, we see you jealous fast fashion brands…
As mentioned before, brands such as I Saw It First saw a 67% increase in revenue when partnering with Love Island. So, the demand is there, but the supply? It’s fleeting. This is where the threat comes in. What is to stop fast fashion brands from re-creating the pre-loved looks on the show? These brands do not want to lose out on that potential revenue, especially as this time of year is very big for them, and if the demand is there… why not?
Now, Love Island cannot be blamed for the possibility that fast fashion brands will recreate the looks, that’s just business baby. But should this have been thought of earlier? If the show wanted to become more sustainable through using pre-loved clothes then why not also integrate new clothes that are sustainable regardless. Meaning that if viewers wanted to ‘get the look’ they could buy it from sustainable slow fashion companies instead of the possible recreations from fast fashion companies. Hence increasing the supply for the demand.
When doing a Google Image search for “Love Island outfits 2022” the ads that are first shown are all fast fashion companies that are already recreating the looks from the show.
Overall, Love Island partnering with eBay for clothing the islanders is 100% a step in the right direction and we applaud them for it, but we’re now in the waiting game, waiting to find out how the fast fashion brands that are missing out get in on the action. We pray that they do not mass produce imitation garments but only time will tell. For now we’re just going to sit back and watch the drama unfold (in Majorca that is) and when we see a dress we like, we might just try and search for it on eBay ourselves first…
Peace and Love,