Get this - British luxury label Burberry burns (burns, yes) its unsold clothes rather than have them sold on the 'grey market' and worn by the 'wrong people,' The Times reports. According to Burberry's latest accounts, Burberry burnt £28 million worth of clothes last year - the equivalent of more than 20,000 of its signature trench coats. Burberry, which is valued at around £9.6 billion by Forbes magazine, destroys unsold stock to prevent it from falling into 'wrong hands,' it is suggested. Designer labels such as Burberry, it is claimed, do not want their products to emerge in the "grey markets" and be sold at knockdown prices. According to the same Times report, insiders suggest that luxury brands destroy unwanted products to protect their intellectual property and brand values. Burberry also admitted to the paper that its unwanted stock is burnt, but they stated that they work with special incinerators that are able to harness the energy from the process.
Burberry, known for its distinctive checked pattern, has burnt £90 million worth of products over the last five years, according to The Times.
Burberry is reportedly claiming to take the issue of waste "extremely seriously", but shareholders in the luxury brand are largely unhappy with the trend. Burberry's measure to stop the counterfeiting of their products has not been received well by the shareholders, with one of them even asking why the unsold products were not offered to the company's private investors, reported The Times.
The fashion label which has worked with some of the world's most renowned models and celebrities, including Emma Watson, Rosie Huntington Whiteley and Cara Delevingne among others, claimed that the practice of destroying excess stock was common across the retail industry. Burberry, which also paid a tribute to the LGBTQ+ community around the world in their February 2018 collection, is a brand that is supported by many celebrities on the regular.
This industry wide practice has left not just shareholders, but also environmentalists rather irritated as TheTimes report revealed that the value of Burberry's waste has gone up by 50 percent in the last two years and is almost six times greater than in 2013.
The Times also reports that Burberry's expensive prices in Asia have contributed to increasingly unsold stock. H&M, Cartier and Montblanc are also believed to destroy unsold products. The Times reports that it approached several designers to ask what they did with leftover inventory, of which only one label - Temperley London - responded to say that clothes were either donated to charity or sold at a discount outlet.
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