Why I never shop at Primark

As almost 300 die in the Bangladesh factory tragedy, fashion editor Karen Dacre says consumer power must force changes in cheap clothing manufacture
Dhaka factory collapse
26 April 2013

My best friend loves Primark. Or “Primani” as she calls it, while regaling me with tales of £8 tea-dresses and £10 Stella McCartney knock-offs. My standard, perhaps pompous, reaction is to turn up my nose.

Not only have I always considered the budget chain a living, breathing example of mass consumerism gone absolutely bonkers — a sort of all-you-can eat buffet for high street fashion shoppers — but I’ve long questioned the ethics of a retailer that could churn out clothing at such bargain bucket prices. “I wouldn’t touch that place with a 10-foot bargepole,” I think, hypocritically oblivious to the origins of my high street sandals perched under the pub table.

I admit when I heard of Primark’s connection with the disaster that took place at the Rana Plaza factory in Bangladesh on Wednesday — the chain is a customer of New Wave Style, the largest factory within the building— and the 273 bodies pulled from the rubble, I felt a sense of inevitability. This latest factory disaster with direct links to the British clothing industry involved a chain that — I presumed — placed the importance of cheap clothes at the pinnacle of its agenda.

And it seemed likely that the huge pressure to produce cheap clothing could have played a part in the building manager’s alleged decision to let people turn up to work despite being warned not to by police who had ordered an evacuation. Yesterday in a statement to the Standard, a spokesman for the brand, which is a member of the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI), said: “Primark confirms that one of its suppliers occupied the second floor of the eight-storey building, which housed several suppliers to the garment industry making clothing for a number of brands.” I was prepared for that too.

What I wasn’t expecting, perhaps naively so, were the suggestions of other brands involved. Among the retailers who allegedly had supply relationships with New Wave Style were a host of household names. They included Matalan, which confirmed New Wave had been a supplier but said it had not had any current production with the firm. Budget chain Bonmarché also confirmed New Wave as one of its suppliers, adding: “We are currently in touch with our agents there to gather further information and offer our assistance.”

Spanish brand Mango, which is also alleged to have had involvement with a Rana Plaza supplier, said: “The businesses affected by the unfortunate accident in Bangladesh are not official suppliers of Mango, although we had established contact with one of them in order to produce a sample order for various lines of the brand.”

When the neighbouring Tazreen factory burned down last December, killing 112 workers, it was an all too similar story. Budget fashion and the Bangladeshi working conditions crisis seem to go hand in hand. It’s not difficult to see why. Of all the countries where fashion manufacturing is a key part of their economy — Cambodia, China and Taiwan to name a few — Bangladesh is among the poorest in the world and thus a star attraction for retailers on the hunt for a supplier that can deliver the cheapest prices in the fastest time.

Clothing production also counts for 82 per cent of Bangladesh’s GDP. As a result, the area of Savar — just outside Dhaka and where both the Rana Plaza and Tazreen factories stood — has seen significant growth in garment factories in recent times, many built on swampland and without proper building regulations.

Labour rights campaigners consider the area one of their greatest causes for concern and regularly call upon all major brands sourcing from Bangladesh to sign the Bangladesh Fire and Building Safety Agreement to prevent future tragedies.

“It’s unbelievable that brands still refuse to sign a binding agreement with unions and labour groups to stop these unsafe working conditions from existing,” says Sam Maher of Labour Behind the Label. “Tragedy after tragedy shows that corporate-controlled monitoring is completely inadequate.”

Maher separately calls for the brands sourcing from the Rana Plaza factory to pay compensation.

“This incident wasn’t the first and sadly won’t be the last,” agrees Alan Roberts, ex-chair of the ETI, adding that while “significant improvements had been made” retailers must “stay put and maintain pressure”. This highlights the duty we all have of continuing to support employment in Bangladesh despite the recent tragedies.

Primark says it will continue an ongoing review into the Bangladeshi industry’s approach to factory standards and into its building integrity, adding “the company is shocked and deeply saddened by this appalling incident”.

It would be too easy for opponents of the chain to put all of the blame on Primark and its fellow retailers. We cannot ignore the huge responsibility suppliers like New Wave have to their employees to pay a fair living wage and keep them safe, plus the role that governments — internationally and in Bangladesh — must play in monitoring factory conditions.

The finger of blame also points in my direction. As a high-street fashion shopper, I’m certainly complicit in the suffering. While I’m happy to enquire about the contents of burgers in Tesco, I’ve yet to ask the sales assistant in my favourite high-street shop to clarify the origins of a blazer I “have to have”. Today I realised that it might make a difference if I did.

“The customer must understand their own impact in this,” agrees Roberts. “We must always ask questions.”

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