For American Apparel and Others, Green is the New Black

The U.S. environmental movement conjures up images of electric cars and solar-powered homes. Al Gore, too.

But fashion retail?

Yes, say industry experts, as a growing list of fashion-savvy companies embrace green products. Everything from recycled polyester socks to backpacks geared with solar panels to company efforts to reduce carbon emissions is evidence of the growing trend, they say.

The outdoor apparel chain REI, for example, sells organic T-shirts and men’s button-up shirts made of hemp. Target now shelves it stores with eco-friendly bookcases and organic cotton dresses and blue jeans. Voltaic Systems makes a backpack with three water proof solar panels that can generate four watts of power. The device can recharge cell phones, cameras and mp3 players.

“Eco-friendly is a direction in which many companies want to go if they are genuinely concerned about the environment," Mark Messura of the trade group Cotton Inc., recently told the Web site Inside Bay Area. "There's also is a segment of the industry that views this as the latest fad to market products."

Retail giant American Apparel, lauded for years for its labor practices, has jumped on the solar-powered bandwagon by manufacturing all its clothing in one downtown Los Angeles location, thus reducing the environmental impact of its clothing production. The production method reduces travel time between its plant and stores, which saves gas and helps reduce carbon emissions, industry experts say.

Other companies, for example, pay up to $400,000 in annual salaries to their employees to “keep flying back and forth to China,” Dov Charney, American Apparel’s chief executive, recently told Apparel magazine. “That adds up too,” he told the magazine. Companies nationwide are finding that environmentally responsible strategies can result in sustainability. More and more, the proof is found in firms’ bottom lines. A growing number of consumers are shopping for socially responsible brands, numerous studies show.

American Apparel recently started pairing its 70s- and 80s-inspired clothing with recycled fashion. This past fall, the chain opened California Vintage, which couples some American Apparel staples like T-shirts and leggings with secondhand clothing purchased at vintage clothing outlets. The idea was born when some American Apparel employees noted the basement of the company’s 800,000 square-foot location in downtown Los Angeles held mounds of vintage clothing. There weren’t enough clothes to fell a thrift store, Mathew Swenson, American Apparel’s brand manager, told the Los Angeles Times. “So we hired some girls and they started shopping, going to rag housed and small thrift stores.”

Now the company regularly buys vintage clothing to stock its 1,200 square foot vintage store on Sunset Boulevard in Echo Park.