To rent...or not to rent?

Eshita Kabra-Davies is the founder and CEO of By Rotation, a clothing rental app created to transform the way people consume fashion.

She created the brand to prolong the life cycle of designer items already in circulation and make sustainable fashion more accessible to people of different socioeconomic backgrounds.

Users of the app are able to rent their clothes to consumers, allowing everyone to enjoy “new” fashion without actually buying anything.

She says: “I think a simple solution that we can all do as regular consumers is share what we already have with each other, or as we like to say, rotate with each other.

“It makes sense to have the sharing economy applied to the fashion industry because we all have way too many clothes. No one’s really attempted to do fashion rental this way, it’s always been about inventory, or access to designers but for us, it’s really about finding women who are similar to you in terms of your style and your taste and borrowing their wardrobe.”

However, Aja Barber says although she loves the rental market, if it’s being used to mimic fast fashion, she doesn’t.

She says: “ If we are pushing this idea that you need new outfits and new items of clothing, this is a culture that needs to change. I think rental can be really great in some ways, but if it becomes the dominant norm of ‘I never wear the same outfit twice’, then it will still have a carbon footprint and it will still harm the planet.”

She says we have to be okay with wearing the same clothes more than once and it’s ultimately down to a cultural shift: “We have to change ourselves, and we have to change the way we interact with all of these systems.”

Sustainable brand owner, Celia Harper, says that renting clothes can be quite inaccessible in terms of price.

She says: “Some dresses are £80 for just a few days and me personally, I would rather spend £80 on an investment piece and keep that forever. I wouldn’t want to spend it on something I’m just borrowing for around three days.

“But, I think if you’ve got a one off event and you want to invest in something really special that you know you're not going to wear again then yes, absolutely it is a good thing to do.”

Eshita however does believe that By Rotation is very inclusive when it comes to socio economics: “You can rent a designer dress for less than a new Zara dress that you might buy. It’s just simple maths that it would be better to borrow something from a woman who actually owns it and return it back to her.

“I think given all these worries about the cost of living crisis, I think people are going to look to find some joy in their life without having to spend large amounts of income, and rental is similar to secondhand resale, but at even lower price points so it’s much more socio-economically inclusive.”

The rental market is very popular across social media and different influencers, including YouTube duo Sophia Tuxford and Cinzia Baylis-Zullo, have used and promoted By Rotation across their socials. Eshita says she has seen a positive boost to her brand as a result of this:

"They've got the perfect audience for whom rental really makes sense and it's really nice seeing a huge variety of women on the app who have opened their wardrobes for their fans to enjoy."

Despite some dispute over the price point and accessibility of renting clothes, it is still one of the many solutions to reducing consumption of new clothes.

If you wish to put your clothes and accessories on the app, or rent items from other people's wardrobes, you can download By Rotation on the Apple App Store ort on Google Play.