sustainable fashion

Acknowledgements
First of all, we would like to give thanks to the 15 schoolmates who have volunteered hours of their time to participate in the focus group interview. Opinions from you all are much appreciated, and it helps a lot in doing this study. Also, thanks to the 175 respondents for spending their precious time on doing the questionnaire. Finally, thanks to our tutor Miss KV HO, whose guiding and encouragement too had provided fuel to us. There were also numerous of teachers from HKDI gave comments to us. Without the above contributor, this work could not be done smoothly.
Abstract
The planet that human lived on has been destroying by us for decades particularly after the Industrial Revolution taken place in the late 18th century. Many human beings focus on money and benefits in order to make their living condition better materially. The large amount of pollutants caused by industrial activities harmed the earth seriously. We could blame the industrialists, and we could blame the people who created the demand as well. Every one of us should be responsible for the damage of the Earth. Fortunately, people have started awakening and alerted. People nowadays have been more aware of the environmental protection. Therefore, more ways of preserving our planet should be explored.
This research would like to explore feasibility for the setting up of DIY workshops which will make green accessories with recyclable and waste materials. It makes use of the concepts of reuse, recycle, reduce and upcycling, as well as enhancing the awareness of people on environmental protection. The primary aim of this research was to explore the people’s preference regarding the workshop, also the viable ways to recycle wastes to operate a DIY workshop that dedicates in turning wastes into upcycled accessory.
Through questionnaires and focus groups discussions conducted with young adults aged 18 to 25, we hope to find out thoroughly the preference of the group of people that we targeted. A total of 175 questionnaires had received, a majority of them (134) claimed that they have never been to any DIY workshop, yet two-third of them (116) expressed that they are quite interested in eco-friendly DIY accessory workshop.

Report Organization
The sequence of the report will begin with a brief introduction as a lead, mentioning the circumstance that the world facing and doing. Explaining why we think there are opportunities for eco-friendly DIY workshop. Secondly there will be an objective list showing the goals which we expect this workshop would achieve.
Then, we will jump to the background and rationale of the report. Proposing our business concept and to describe the details of the business mode, services provided and charges, etc.
And following will be research methodology, demonstrating the methods that we adopted to gather information, including our target customer’s preference, materials and styles of accessory they are interested in. Then findings from questionnaires and focus groups will be reported.
At the end, we will come up with a conclusion and limitation that we are facing in this research.
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
Sustainability and being eco-friendly have become important issues in fashion industry. Launching green collection is no longer new for the brands such as Vivienne Westwood, Stella McCartney, Carrie Parry, 100% NY, Lara Miller and Titania Inglis, and definitely this trend will last for years. The world now is more focused on the environment than ever before. People have noticed that the wastage problem and sustainability do matter to our future. In addition, there are more well-educated students with eco-friendly knowledge as there are more and more courses related to environmental protection launched by tertiary institutions. Moreover, there are at least 4 series of green activities or competitions held by the Environmental Protection Department, denoting that the importance of being green is increasing. Besides, there are lots of workshops about leather goods and accessories, yet workshops related to accessories made by waste material are rare. Therefore, this field is ready and waiting for exploration. The teenagers nowadays are not looking for products that made by any brands in the market, but to build up their own unique style. Therefore, they will seek for personalized or unusual accessories through ways such as DIY. Also, most of the teenagers prefer making items themselves and enjoying the creative process, rather than buying all they need in a store. Hence, we are going to investigate feasibility of operating a DIY workshop.

Objectives
1. To enhance the awareness of environment protection
2. To encourage people to make good utilization of waste
3. To promote ‘Do It Yourself’ (DIY) practice
4. To reduce environmental pollution and workload of landfill
5. To deepen people’s understanding of fashion sustainability
6. To encourage people to put the concept of sustainable fashion into practice

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Questionnaire
Regarding the primary research, 175 questionnaires were distributed to teenagers and young adults aged 12-31 through the internet. People’s interest in DIY practice and their willingness of wearing accessory which made by used waste could be investigated.
The question asked if the respondents have ever participated in any DIY workshop. Also, the question asked them what kind of workshop they had participated in and how they knew the DIY workshops. For the respondents who had never participated in DIY workshop, they were required to complete question which asked about the reasons they didn’t join the workshop. The question concerned if the respondents will be interested in a workshop in which waste or recycle material will be used to make accessories. Moreover, it asked about the acceptable price range and the suitable location of our workshop, the respondents what kind of waste materials and what kind of style they are interested in. The question also focused on the suitable price range for the finished eco-friendly accessory. Moreover, we evaluated how much the respondents know about the cloths re-fashion services and investigated their interest in consignment service.

3.2 Focus Group Interview
The focus group was formed and it is targeted at young adults between the ages of 18 to 25. The comments were asked from those interviewee on some accessory samples which were made by us. Therefore, their preference of accessory style could be investigated.

3.3 Internet Research
With regard to the secondary research, the information that has similar business in foreign and local country was studied. We would like to know how they run their business and collect the used waste. On the other hand, we look for some similar purpose workshops, and get an outline of what we should include inside our product category. Besides, we try to find out are there any policy provide by the government that’s aim the support some workshop like ours.

CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH FINDINGS
4.1 Questionnaire
We have started an online survey to collect opinions from most of the market segments for our Eco-friendly DIY workshop. Our aim is to construct a framework of our workshop through this survey such as categories, price, place, material, etc.
In March 2014, the survey involved 175 respondents on the internet. First of all, we divided them into different groups by gender, age, job occupation and month salary.

4.1.1 Demographic data
Regarding the demographic data, the number of female respondents (57%) was slightly more than that of male respondents (43%) (Refer to Figure 1). There are more than one hundred respondents were between the age of seventeen to twenty-one (68%) (Refer to Figure 2). Also, about seventy percent of them were students with the monthly income below $5000 (69%), which may indicate that their spending power is not high (Refer to Figure 4).

4.1.2 Findings
From the result, there are many respondents (134) have not participated in any kind of workshop (Refer to Figure 5). It shows that DIY workshop is not very popular in Hong Kong, but we do believe that the situation will improve with a proper way of promotion.
Dessert (28%) and leather accessories (24%) workshop have a great share of the respondents who had participated in DIY workshop. Metal accessories placed in third (17%). There are thirteen percent of respondents who had participated in crystal accessories and eleven present of them joined fabric workshop. There are few people (4%) had tried the body care materials workshop and some other workshop like tattoo (Refer to Figure 6).
Regarding the promotion channels, most of respondents knew the DIY workshop through friend’s recommendation (38%) and social network (30%). Few of respondents knew that through official website (16%) and leaflet (9%) (Refer to Figure 7).
About half of the respondents were not interested in any kind of DIY workshop (45%), and a quarter of them didn’t join because they were not available or the schedule of the workshop was not suitable for them (25%). Thirteen percent of them thought price is a big problem and five percent of them thought that the location was not convenient enough (Refer to Figure 8). The rest of them mentioned some other problems. For instance, some said “I don’t know how can I join even I want to” and “Never heard of it”.
Most of the respondents (66%) will join a workshop in which recycle materials will be used for making accessories (Refer to Figure 9).
The result shows that the most popular price respondents (60%) would be willing to pay is HK$100 to HK$149, this was the cheapest price we offered. However, only a few of respondents (10%) were willing to pay up HK$200 (Refer to Figure 10). Therefore, we could potentially choose a reasonable price within the cheapest price range we offered.
In order to realize what eco-friendly accessories might be popular in DIY workshop, respondents were asked to select the best possible answers that indicate the waste materials they are willing to use to make accessories and they are favor to wear. The rankings were as follows from the most popular to the least popular materials: Rags (24.1%), metal (20.1%), dried flower (16.8%) and plastic (14.6%). However, only a few of respondents selected paper, aluminum and glass (Refer to Figure 12). A respondent even worried about the safety of making accessory by glass. Moreover, the respondents thought that the appearance of final products is the important factor of purchasing them.
Concerning the preference of accessory style, 104 respondents (59.4%) like minimalist and neutral accessories which are the most popular styles in the result. 41 respondents (23.4%) like retro style, while another 21 respondents (12.0%) like folk style. They are mainly female. Besides, only a minority of them like the rock style and respondents who like it almost all are male (Refer to Figure 13).
Regarding the charges of eco-friendly accessories, the most popular price respondents (58%) would be willing to pay is HK$80 to HK$123. Only a few of respondents (11%) were willing to pay up HK$180 (Refer to Figure 15).
Although 87 respondents (49.7%) had never heard about the service of Re-fashion, more than half of the respondents are willing to pay for this service (Refer to Figure 16 & Figure 17).
More than half of respondents would consider consigning their green designs or “DIY” products for sale and a quarter of respondents would like to participate in consignment service (Refer to Figure 18). Although the majority of them are students and their monthly incomes are below $5000, they want to start their own eco-friendly or “DIY” business with limited investment.

4.1.3 Discussion
Although this survey could not represent the entire population due to its small sample size, it can still reveal some important findings. The survey revealed the reasons for the low popularity of DIY workshops as many respondents had not joined any of them. For instance, there is a lack of promotion and a lack of channels for them to seek information from. Other possible reasons may be the young age and relatively low income of them. Since most of our respondents are in between the age of 17 and 21 and have less than five thousands income per month, they may use most of the time to study and may lack of money.
Many respondents had not ever joined DIY workshop since the workshops in Hong Kong lack attractiveness and innovation. Therefore, the various services should be provided for the customers in order to increase the workshop 's attractiveness such as consignment service. Also, the result shows that most of the respondents knew the DIY workshop through friend’s recommendation and social network. Therefore, the business of DIY workshop should focus on the indispensable promotion of social network.
Although many respondents had not joined any kind of workshop, most of them will be interested to join the workshop which allows them to make eco-friendly accessories. It seems that they have a strong ethos of environmental awareness and they are curious about eco-friendly workshop. Regarding the charges of DIY workshop, most of the respondents who were the students with low spending power chose the cheapest price range within HK$100 to HK$149 in the questionnaire. They desired to participate in a DIY workshop within a lower price range. The price range is suggested to set higher and the discount is suggested to offer for the students such as 10% off discount. Also, DIY business might need to plan a variety of pricing strategies in order to increase the workshop 's attractiveness.

4.1.4 Conclusion
In conclusion, respondents generally are interested in DIY accessory workshop which is related to eco-friendly but in a right place, right time and right place. Also, promotion is needed for recruiting the potential customers. In Hong Kong, although the dessert and leather accessory workshops are dominant, it seems that the numbers of those workshops are excessive. There is only a minority of workshops are related to eco-friendly in the market.

4.2 Focus Groups Interview
The participates in the focus groups were asked open-ended questions regarding participants’ knowledge of the ecological impacts of the green accessories, their interest in environmental accessories, their desired level of involvement in the redesign process, and how much they would be willing to pay for a similar service.

4.2.1 Willingness to Pay for Accessories Package
Many participants said their willingness to pay for accessories package depends on multiple factors, including recyclable materials, original garment price or quality, complexity of redesign, and amount of labor involved. Only 25% of participants discussed a specific amount of money they were willing to pay for one accessories package. Their answers ranged from HKD59 to HKD 89. “The cost of handmade accessories is between the $80 and $140 from the market. Therefore, I think you can sell accessories between $50 and $100. Some of the materials can also attract some customers such as metal leather and crystal so you can increase the price of these materials.”

4.2.2 The Location
Many participants said that they like workshop setting up at industrial building because rents of upstairs stores are lower. Also, industrial buildings are known by many people. In recent years, more and more workshops are set up at industrial building. However, the transportation may be inconvenient and it may be difficult to make advertisements. Therefore, it is difficult to attract more customers. As for Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre, interviews revealed that it is not suitable for the workshop to set up because of small area. There is not enough rooms for setting up equipment. “There is not enough room for your workshop at Jockey at Club Creative Arts Centre because the area is only 300 feet. The area is not enough for you to store stuff and your trainees to make accessories. Therefore, industrial building is more suitable for your workshop but the place is quite remote and inconvenience transportation. So, the advertisements should be attractive in order to catch customers’ attention.”

4.2.3 Cost of Re-design Service with Guidance Provision:
A large number (40%) of customers thought that re-design with guidance should be charged according to the length of time. Their answers ranged from $120 to $200, but some tools will be provided for free in our workshop. For example, the charge will be $120 per two hours. Customers will be charged for extra money when they need more time.
“I can accept $120~$150 to re-design or make my own accessory, but those who are need more time to make their accessory over a few hours. I think you need to set up a standard charge per hour and have a material menu so that customers can choose the materials and timing to design their accessory. As a result, it can make the right charge for each customer.”

4.2.4 Provide Consignment Service
Almost half (45%) of our customers responded that they would like to place their DIY accessories at our workshop for sale. It will be charged 10% to 5% of the selling price. If it’s a DIY accessories but not related to eco-friendly, it’ll be charged 10% of the selling price and if it is related to green element, the charge will be decrease to 5% of the selling price. Never the less, they also mentioned that the workshop should have a certain well-known channels and consumers.
We know if we set the charging method to rental, it will be more stable and reduces the rick, but after we discuss about this, we are not trying to make profile out of the consignment store, our aim of setting up the consignment store are providing a small area, to deepen the idea of Do It Yourself, and let the customer prove it themselves. Nevertheless by providing a corner of the shop, the customer can share and combine their idea of how to make a better, greener accessories, it’s the best way to spread the idea of Green accessories. And the low rent of 10% to 5% is way more attractive than setting a monthly rent to $200 - $300 when the spending power of our customer isn’t that high and the price of our products we selling aren’t expensive.
“It’s acceptable with the cost of just 10%-5%, when the publicity of your store isn’t high enough for me to invest more than that. In my opinion, you can adjust the rental according to the performance in the past of your consignment store to provide the best service in the best income.”

4.2.5 The Preference of Accessory Style
We gave three different types of accessories to the interviewees, including the style of Minimalist and neutral style, Folk and Retro. Then asked them to choose which one they like the most. Half of the interviewees felt that they like the Minimalist and Neutral style. Over a quarter of them like Folk style. Three out of tenths like Retro style. None of them like the Rock style. They pointed out that different style is unique. This is a very subjective for them to choose their favorable style. Therefore, it cannot represent the fashion trend. So we need to design different diversification style accessories in order to attract more customers.
“It is my favorable minimalist style accessories. It can represent my personality, which I always wear this kind of accessories. I think most people will like minimalist accessories. However, other people do not like it. Therefore, it could not only design minimalist style accessories. You can design more variety accessories.”

4.3 Internet Research

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION
A DIY workshop that dedicate in eco-friendly material is expected to set up, which targeting 16 to 25 teenagers and adults. Providing services such as tutorial, adding trims consignment and recycling wastes. Also, will be selling DIY packages to people who are too busy to attend our workshop classes. Regarding the source of the material, cooperating with different wastes recyclist will be under consideration as well.
Although the eco-friendly issue is an old idea, not innovative enough, but eco-friendly in workshop is quite an area worth to explore. And there might be deficiency in this proposal, but based on the previous researches, the focus groups and questionnaires we conducted, an opportunity has been found.

CHAPTER 6: LIMITATIONS
This research has limitations that must be considered when interpreting the results. The number of people being examined was few therefore the result would not be representative, and the percentage of respondent’s job occupation maybe not exactly the same with the percentage of our target market, that’s make our result of interview or questionnaire have an error between the real situation. The preference of materials, styles might not be match with the majority.
On the other hand , the sources of waste is from waste collector, as we know they are collecting waste from street collector, and the unit they use is kilogram. So we are facing a question of, should we buy the waste from waste collector with the unit of KG? If yes, how can we make sure we can have a decent percentage of waste which we can really recycle or redesign them into accessories? If no, we might need to sort the waste by hand one by one, which is very time consuming. Moreover, if we find the right waste collector, but our buying offer is too low (e.g.: 5KG), then we need to increase our offer, that turns out another question, Storage. The place we are planning to tenant is a small unit, and we don’t expect they will provide a big area for us to store our material with that low rent.

References
Living green magazine. 2013. Four Very Eco-Friendly Fashion Designer [Internet]
(Updated 23 May 2013) Available at [accessed 5 November 2013]

JCCAC. 2011. About JCCAC [online].
Available at: http://www.jccac.org.hk/?a=group&id=b_1 [accessed 28 October 2013]

Ecopedia. 2013 .10 Fashion Designers With An Eco-Friendly Flair [Internet]
(Updated 5 May 2013) Available at: http://www.ecopedia.com/design/10-fashion-designers-with-an-eco-friendly-flair/ [accessed 15 October 2013]

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Youlookfab. 2009. What do you say with your individual style? [Internet] (Updated 13 March 13) Available at: http://youlookfab.com/2009/03/13/what-do-you-say-with-your-individual-style/ [accessed 23 October 2013]

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Appendix A: QUESTIONNAIRE QUESTIONS
1) What is your gender?
□Male
□Female

2) How old are you?
□12-16
□17-21
□22-26
□27-31

3) What 's your occupation?
□Secretarial, Administrative staff
□Marketing Representative, Sales
□Engineer
□Technician
□Research personnel
□Management
□Executive commissioner
□Service personnel
□Teacher/ Tutor
□Medical staff
□Dealer
□Creative workers
□Student
□Unemployed
□Other______________________

4) Income:
□Below $5000
□$5000 - $10000
□$10000 - $20000
□Above $20000
5) Have you ever joined any DIY Workshop?
□Yes (Go to 7,8)
□No (Go to 6)

6) If not, why don 't you participate in the DIY Workshop?
□Unsuitable time
□Unsuitable location
□Too expensive
□Find no interest in DIY Workshop

7) If yes, what type(s) of DIY Workshop have you joined?
□Leather accessories
□Metal / Plastic accessories
□Crystal accessories
□Fabric
□Dessert / Food
□Body care materials
□Other______________________

8) How do you know the DIY Workshop?
□Magazine interview / magazine advertisement
□Newspaper
□Leaflet
□Website
□Social network (e.g. Facebook, Instagram)
□Friend’s recommendation
□Other______________________

9) Will you be interested to participate in the DIY Workshop which allows making accessories by the recyclable and waste materials?
□Yes
□No

10) How much would you pay for an DIY Workshop of environmental accessories?
□$100 - $149
□$150 - $199
□$200 - $249
□$250- $299
□Other______________________

11) Which place is the DIY Workshop store suitable to locate？
□Industrial building
□Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre(JCCAC)
□Upstairs store
□Other______________________

12) What waste materials would you use to manufacture accessories and you will wear it? (Multiple selections)
□Rags
□Plastic
□Aluminum
□Glass bottle
□Metal
□Dried flower
□Paper
□Other______________________

13)What type of accessories do you like?
□Folk style
□Retro
□Minimalist / Neutral
□Rock style
□Other______________________

14) What types of accessories do you wear? (Multiple selections)
□Bracelet
□Hand strap/Hand rope
□Bangle
□Necklace
□Earrings
□Ring
□Watch
□Slave bracelet
□Other______________________

15) How much would you pay for accessory package which are made by recyclable and waste materials?
□$80 - $129
□$130 - $179
□$180 - $229
□$230 - $279
□Other______________________

16. Have you ever received information about the service of apparel processing?(*Customers bring their garment with charges to the store. The staff will help them to add some green accessories or trimmings they like on the clothes)
□Yes
□No
17. Will you pay for this service?
□Yes
□No
□Other______________________

18. Will you consign your own designs or finished products for sale? (Made by waste materials or environmental-based)
□Yes
□No
□Can be considered

Appendix B: FOCUS GROUP QUESTIONS
1. How much would you pay for an accessories package?
2. Which place is the DIY Workshop store suitable to locate?
3. How much would you pay for the Redesign service with guidance provision?
4. Are you willing to be on consignment with our workshop?
5. Which is your preference of accessory style?

List of Figures
Figure 1. Gender

Figure 2. Age

Figure 3. Occupation

Figure 4. Month Salary

Figure 5. Participation of DIY Workshop

Figure 6. The Types of DIY Workshop that Have Ever Participated

Figure 7. Channel of Information Received

Figure 8. The Reasons that Have Never Participated DIY workshop

Figure 9. The Interest about DIY Green Accessories Workshop

Figure 10. Preferred price range of DIY Workshop

Figure 11. The Most Suitable Location for DIY Workshop

Figure 12. Preference of Waste Materials

Figure 13. Preference of Accessory Style

Figure 14. The Accessories that Have Worn In Daily Life

Figure 15. Preferred Price Range of Green Accessory Package

Figure 16. The Information Received about Apparel Re-fashion Service

Figure 17. Willingness of Paying Apparel Re-fashion Service

Figure 18. Willingness of Green Consignment Service

References: Living green magazine. 2013. Four Very Eco-Friendly Fashion Designer [Internet] (Updated 23 May 2013) Available at [accessed 5 November 2013] JCCAC. 2011. About JCCAC [online]. EPA.2013.News & Events [Online] (updates 21 Aug 2013) Available at http://www.epd.gov.hk/epd/english/news_events/archive2013.html (accessed 18 October 2013) Youlookfab. 2009. What do you say with your individual style? [Internet] (Updated 13 March 13) Available at: http://youlookfab.com/2009/03/13/what-do-you-say-with-your-individual-style/ [accessed 23 October 2013] HKTDC