There's nothing like a pandemic to get to see in real time how different brands are stepping up to offer solutions on behalf of the world. Fashion folk were shocked when Mr. Armani cancelled his fashion show on the last day of Milan Fashion Week, now a prescient action that at the time was deemed potentially overblown. But Armani was a believer of #socialdistancing way back in February (because yes, it feels like a lifetime ago, a different era!). Now with cities, countries and communities on lockdown, the entire fashion industry faces the big unknown, the pause button giving both anxiety but also opportunity to rethink what the new normal will become. 

With little positive news to grasp onto, we at Because have felt optimism every time we hear of a brand -fashion and beauty, both independent and conglomerate alike - galvanizing and rallying their teams in support of pro-active initiatives to help combat the pandemic.

These initiatives range from monetary donations such as the 200,000 euros Donatella Versace and her daughter, Allegra Versace Beck, have given to the intensive care department of San Raffaele Hospital in Milan and the $100,000 Marco Bizzarri, the CEO of Gucci, and Sergio Rossi have each donated to hospitals in Italy.

To product donations: in the UK Sophia Webster is donating 200 pairs of its FlyBy trainers to NHS staff, John Lewis are also gifting items to the NHS and The Body Shop are donating care packages. 

Many brands are also donating a proportion of their profits to effort: Three Graces London is donating 100% of their net sales until 1st April to the homeless charity Crisis; Alice + Olivia are donating 10% of their sales to No Kid Hungry;  Sézane is donating 10% of its sales to support French hospitals; Staud is offering a 25% off sale until March 31 and is donating 10% of sales to help provide meals to people in Los Angeles and Zaidig & Voltaire are donating 20% of the sales of its new collection to the Foundation Hospitals of Paris - Hospitals of France.

Or helping with the supply of medical resources: the co-CEOs, Patrizio Bertelli and Miuccia Prada, and chairman, Carlo Mazzi, of Prada have donated six intensive care and resuscitation units to hospitals in Milan; Bulgari has donated to the research department at the Instituto Lazzaro Spallanzani in Rome; Georgio Armani has donated $1.4 million to hospitals in Italy  and Moncler has donated 10 million euros to support the Fiera Hospital project in Lombardy to help construct a hospital with more than 400 intensive care units.

And the manufacture of essential equipment: In the UK the British Fashion Council has announced that it will be working with both the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Department for Health and Social Care to help manufacture essential products (if you are able to offer support contact info@britishfashioncouncil.com).

Phoebe English has been making face masks in London and is also offering assistance with food and medication to anyone who needs it in the SE8 area of London. And Pyer Moss has transformed its office in New York into a centre for medical supplies.

After donating $2.2 million to the Red Cross in China in February, it took LVMH, who own Fendi, Givenchy and Dior, only 72 hours to begin transferring some of their cosmetics factories to the manufacture of hydroalcoholic gel. They are also going to provide around 40 million surgical masks. Kering Group are providing France with 3 million masks, and their subsidiary brands are also supporting the effort with Gucci planning to donate 1 million masks and 55,000 medical overalls and Saint Laurent and Balenciaga also beginning to produce masks.

Mango will donate 2 million masks and H&M Group is also going to transfer some of its production to masks and overalls. Inditex, which owns Zara, has begun to produce hospital overalls in Spain and are also helping with the logistics of supplying medical materials globally.

These actions will long be remembered by consumers when we get out of this together - the acts of kindness, the mobilizing of resources to quickly pivot to critical, essential items and the proactive donations by those who have more than they need to help those who don't. 


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