Let's start with a number that's hard to sit with.
The global fashion industry produces somewhere between
80 and 100 billion new garments every year.
For a planet of 8 billion people, that's roughly
12 new pieces of clothing per person, per year —
whether they want them or not.
Most of those pieces weren't made for anyone specific.
They were made on speculation. A bet that someone,
somewhere, would want them.
A lot of that bet loses.
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The industry has a word for what happens next:
deadstock.
Unsold inventory. Garments that were manufactured,
shipped, stored, discounted, and eventually destroyed —
without ever being worn.
Burberry made headlines in 2018 for incinerating
£28 million worth of unsold goods in a single year.
They weren't an anomaly. They were just honest about it.
The standard practice in fashion is to overproduce
and destroy the surplus. It keeps prices high.
It keeps the brand "exclusive."
The garment paid the price. The planet paid the price.
The customer just didn't know.
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We found this out early and it changed how we think
about everything.
Not in a performative way — we're not going to put
a leaf on our logo and call it sustainable.
But in a practical way: if we don't know someone
wants it, we don't make it.
That's the entire logic of print on demand.
Your order comes in. The garment is produced.
It gets shipped to you.
No warehouse. No surplus. No speculation.
No garments sitting in a box somewhere waiting
to be incinerated.
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There are trade-offs. We should be honest about them.
Print on demand costs more per unit than bulk production.
Which means our prices are higher than fast fashion.
Production takes longer than pulling from existing stock.
Which means your order takes a few days more.
We think those trade-offs are worth it.
But we'd rather you know they exist than pretend
this model is perfect.
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What it comes down to is this:
Every Norpex piece exists because you wanted it.
Not because a buyer in a boardroom predicted you would.
Not because we needed to hit a production minimum.
Not because a factory had leftover capacity.
Because you chose it.
That feels like the right way to make clothing.
At least to us.
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NORPEX