Shein (pronounced SHE-in), the online mega-retailer, announced on Aug. 9 it would be selling its fast-fashion clothes in Cincinnati’s Kenwood Towne Centre for four days only.
“With new products being added every day, the shop will feature favorites from SHEIN’s womens, curve and men’s collections,” reads a release from a PR agency promoting the pop-up.
Shein, a Chinese-based company, held their first United States pop-up in 2018 in Miami, Florida. Cut to five years later, after the company pushed through the pandemic with ease, Shein has returned to the U.S., popping up in Las Vegas, Seattle, Indianapolis and now Cincinnati.
The timing of Shein’s Cincinnati pop-up, which starts today and lasts through Aug. 13, incites suspicion after the brand drew criticism following a recent influencer partnership.
The trip meant to promote transparency
In June, Shein flew a group of influencers from TikTok, Instagram and YouTube to Guangzhou in southeast China. The trip was meant to show these influencers’ millions of followers that Shein’s often single-digit-priced apparel is produced ethically. The company has for years faced criticism for its environmental waste and alleged human rights violations, including forced labor and lead exposure.
In an apparent attempt to remedy this image, influencers were taken on a guided factory tour by Shein, meeting employees and learning about their day-to-day lives. But commenters were quick to point out how the entire trip was staged to appear transparent.
“They showed you what they wanted you to see,” one commenter said below a video that glowed with Shein praise from Instagram Influencer Dani Carbonari.
Heavy backlash eventually caused Carbonari to walk back her endorsement of Shein, saying in a video posted on June 28, “I made a mistake, I made a huge mistake. I always try to lead with me, my younger self and my community in mind and I let us down.”
While Carbonari said she ended her brand partnership contract with Shein upon arrival back to the U.S., she did not address the concerns about forced labor in her apology video.
Shein reportedly responded to criticism from the influencer partnership by saying, “Shein is committed to transparency and this trip reflects one way in which we are listening to feedback, providing an opportunity to show a group of influencers how Shein works through a visit to our innovation center and enabling them to share their own insights with their followers.”
Now, rather than bringing influencers and their followers to their factories, Shein has made the rare decision to promote itself by bringing their clothes to Cincinnati consumers IRL.
Congress is getting involved
A new congressional report titled “Fast Fashion and the Uyghur Genocide,” published in June, raises issues with Shein’s ability to avoid U.S. import regulations that seek to keep slave-created products out of the U.S. marketplace, known as the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. The report claims Shein and Temu, another fast-fashion retailer out of China, use a loophole in the Tariff Act of 1930, known as the de minimis rule. The de minimis rule allows importers like Shein to avoid customs duties on incoming packages that are valued at less than $800.
“In 2022, 685 million shipments entered the United States under de minimis,” the report reads. “This means that duty-free shipments from just two companies – Temu and Shein – likely amount to more than 30 percent of all global de minimis shipments into the United States.”
Because the de minimis loophole only applies to direct-to-consumer goods, it’s unclear if the clothes sold in Shein’s Cincinnati pop-up have skirted customs compliance.
The report is preliminary and says Congress will continue to question Shein, Temu, Adidas and Nike about their business practices.
Shein’s PR reps for the Cincinnati pop-up did not respond to CityBeat‘s request for comment.
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This article appears in Aug 9-22, 2023.