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What kind of socioeconomic background are you from — and can you make it in the luxury fashion industry if you’re not super connected and financially stable? These are the kind of questions that the fashion industry doesn’t like to answer. “Socioeconomic status isn’t its own conversation,” says Jamie Gill, founder of London-based non-profit talent incubator The Outsiders Perspective. He maintains that while gender and race representation in fashion have improved significantly, socioeconomic status is “low down the understanding criteria. Even the lack of data around [it] is scarcer — it is very much a blind spot.”
This year is set to be the biggest election year in history, with over 50 countries, including the UK and the US, holding elections. Important issues, such as education, houses, wages and taxes, are all in focus, all of which disproportionately affect those with lesser socioeconomic privilege. Experts say it’s a year when bigger conversations should be held about the challenges in workplace progression for the socioeconomically disadvantaged.
Part of the problem is that fashion companies don’t fully understand the challenges associated with a lack of socioeconomic privilege, nor how to address them. High-end fashion is an industry full of exclusivity and pre-set biases, privilege, wealth, status and nepotism. For outsiders, it can sometimes feel like trying to gain entry to an exclusive club.
According to data from Vogue Business’s Debunking the Dream series, which surveyed 667 fashion workers primarily in the UK, the US and Europe, nearly half (47 per cent) of survey respondents with family in fashion said their socioeconomic status positively impacted their careers. Furthermore, those who attended fee-paying schools were also more likely (46 per cent) to say their socioeconomic status had a positive impact on their career. The percentage for those without a private education was 36.
Asked whether they feel they are offered the same opportunities as others, a 14 per cent difference emerged between those respondents from privileged groups and those from less-privileged socioeconomic backgrounds, according to data published by the British Fashion Council’s UK Fashion DEI Report 2024.
Fashion brands that don’t spread their socioeconomic recruitment net wide may also be missing out on talent opportunities. In the UK, think Burberry’s chief creative officer Daniel Lee, son of a mechanic and an office worker, or the late Alexander McQueen, whose father was a taxi driver.
As a first step, experts point to the need for best practices such as rethinking education requirements, being more flexible on remote work opportunities, scrapping unpaid internships, encouraging mentorship, relieving recruitment biases and encouraging those in leadership to speak out. “The fashion industry is so highly visible and influential, it does have the unique real opportunity to lead change,” says Ben de Pfeiffer-Key, inclusive talent strategist and coach, who previously worked at Capri Holdings.
Building equitable access to education
Change begins in the education system, experts say. For many, attending a top fashion school is out of the question due to location, fees and, perhaps, a feeling that the higher education system is not meant for them. Graduating from an elitist institution offers you a “stamp of approval — there’s so much snobbery around the exclusivity of which higher institution you attended”, says Daniel Peters, founder of consultancy the Fashion Minority Report. “What about the greatness that companies are missing out on from people who aren’t always given the tools, resources and opportunities to attend?”
Kirsty Nevett, online course leader for MA strategic fashion marketing at London College of Fashion, part of University of the Arts London (UAL), says, “As an educator, this is going to be controversial, but [university] is not essential.” More accessible and affordable options offered by London College of Fashion include entirely online postgraduate degrees and short courses. “Online learning is so exciting because it gives access to those who want to but can’t,” says Nevett.
Out of 12 brands contacted by Vogue Business, only Burberry responded, outlining its strategy for creating access for those with less socioeconomic privilege. “We believe that talent can come from many different paths and as a creative business, we understand that our collective strength lies in the diversity of our experiences,” says Geoffrey Williams, Burberry’s global VP of diversity, equity and inclusion. Burberry has partnered with institutions including Central Saint Martins, the Institut Français de la Mode, The New School’s Parsons School of Design and The Brit School to provide scholarships and bursary programmes that support students with tuition and living costs.
Pfeiffer-Key suggests a positive step might be to remove degree requirements from job applications and instead focus on skills-based assessments. He also proposes “better investment in [under-represented] talent once they are in an organisation to fund further education opportunities such as MBAs to help close the socioeconomic pay gap longer term.”
Getting your foot in the door
Unpaid internships are another manifestation of systematic bias that allows those from a comfortable background to get ahead, says Christopher ‘CJ’ Gross, author of What s Your Zip Code Story?: Understanding and Overcoming Class Bias in the Workplace. Unpaid internships remain a very significant feature of the modern fashion industry — according to Vogue Business’s survey, 63 per cent have taken on unpaid work at some point in their careers — and without those internship opportunities, it can be difficult to build the experience to succeed. “If you cannot afford an internship where you’re not getting paid, that’s a barrier. It is a blind spot to those in a place of privilege, when you have access you assume everyone else has access,” he says. The solution is simple: ensure all interns are paid for their labour.
A strong network of connections is also considered very important for navigating a career in the fashion industry, but those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds often struggle in this respect. “The biggest resource is people. If you can afford to live near or in that space, you can have access to people and you can have access to opportunities,” explains Gross.
To lower the barrier to entry, companies could accommodate flexible ways of working. There has been some progress on this front, particularly since the Covid pandemic. UK-based luxury resale platform Luxe Collective is based in Liverpool, where CEO and co-founder Ben Gallagher stays true to his roots and his mission to make luxury more attainable. “This location allows us to offer an alternative for people who aspire to work in the luxury sector without relocating to London, where they could potentially be priced out. We’re proud of this decision — we’ve built an incredible team of talented, experienced individuals who are proud to work up north,” he says.
Exceptionally low pay in the fashion industry is another barrier for employees with no savings or family support struggling in entry-level positions. Pfeiffer-Key has seen talent working two to four jobs just to make ends meet.
Best recruitment practices include deconstructing biases, exploring remote work opportunities or ensuring the application process is accessible (some companies allow candidates to type their application in text boxes rather than requiring a PDF upload, which can lower the barrier for people who don’t have access to a laptop). Experts also agree that mentorship is a useful means for supporting young people from different backgrounds to build networks and skill sets.
Progressing in the industry
Representation at leadership level is extremely lacking. Those from challenging socioeconomic backgrounds still feel “this isn’t for us to go further or get to leadership level”, Gill says.
There’s a pressure to fit in, too, by changing accents or dressing differently. “The weight that is put on talent to fit culturally is one of the biggest barriers,” says Pfeiffer-Key. Companies should nurture talent from working-class backgrounds, says Peters, pointing out that talent often simply gives up and leaves.
Those who do make it to leadership roles can play an influential part in breaking down the barriers for others, says Gross. “They are more likely to say, ‘Well, wait a minute, that person may not be able to afford it.’ That creates more of a trickle-down [effect] to create more equity for hiring for the interns.”
Those from under-represented socioeconomic backgrounds that do make it to the top, have a special responsibility, suggests Pfeiffer-Key. “We need to offer better representation at a senior level and talk to those experiences of coming from those backgrounds,” he says. “If you want to see yourself represented in a boardroom, that requires leaders to talk about it more.”
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