Local businesses and students combat holiday overconsumption
Introduction
Overconsumption is excessive production and producing of goods, resources and services leading to environmental and social issues. According to an article by King’s College London, seasonal purchases fill our homes and amplify the holiday spirit; however, they come with hefty physiological and environmental costs. Local businesses like Project ReWear and James Storehouse, as well as students at Newbury Park High School [NPHS] and corporations like Athens Services, are all in efforts during the holiday season to help minimize overconsumption both by collecting and providing clothing essentials to those who need them and working toward effective waste removal.
Project Rewear
Project ReWear, a locally owned and operated second-hand store, addresses the overconsumption of clothes in Thousand Oaks. Founded in December 2024 by Kimberly Elmouchi and Linda Young, Project ReWear’s goal is to stop fast fashion’s cyclical nature that involves low-quality and inexpensive clothing being mass-produced for trends before losing popularity and being donated or thrown away. Project ReWear has saved 3,547 pounds of clothes from landfills since its opening. “We’re trying to at least have people really second-guess and think about some of their purchases and make more conscious ones,” Elmouchi said.
Elmouchi highlighted her belief in the necessity of shopping second-hand instead of buying fast-fashion for its often low prices. “When you think of cost, you should always think of ‘at what cost’, and not just what cost it costs you financially, what cost to our planet, what cost to our kids’ future, what cost to the workers that are actually making garments that are being sent and sold for $5,” Elmouchi said.
Surrounding the winter holiday season, Project ReWear has seen a large influx of donations, collecting from 50 to 200 pounds of donations every day. Project ReWear also partners with Bundles of Kindness, a nonprofit that creates care packages with clothes and food for homeless people in Los Angeles.
James Storehouse
James Storehouse is a local non-profit organization in Thousand Oaks that specializes in providing children in foster care with clothing and other essentials. Jennifer Ash works as the Operations Manager at the organization. With their program, a social worker can either submit a referral for a kid to pick out their essentials or the caretaker can pick items out for them. “We are almost 100% community donation-based, and the majority of that is gently used clothing. We’re giving kids in foster care warm, wonderful clothes, but we’re also giving the clothing a second life,” Ash said.
During the holiday season, she finds a dearth of certain types of clothing due to the weather changes. “We do run out of the larger styles a lot more than we usually do, and there’s just a lot more need during the holidays because it’s the cold months,” Ash said.
According to Earth.org, 92 million tons of clothes-related waste each year was discarded, which is the equivalent to a garbage truck of clothing being dumped in a landfill or destroyed every second. “[We are] getting resources into the hands of people that need it, but it’s also keeping perfectly wonderful clothes from ending up in a landfill,” Ash said.
Saulgaab Diaz
As an avid shopper at thrift stores, the Goodwill bins and Depop, Saulgaab Diaz, junior, prefers to shop second-hand. “I think [fast fashion is] very wasteful because a lot of it doesn’t get bought, so then they just throw it out, and it just creates a lot of landfill,” Diaz said.
The fast fashion industry employs around 60 million workers globally, however only less than 2% earn a living wage, and workers face dangerous working conditions, excessive hours and gender-based harassment, according to earthday.org. “Overconsumption can lead to a lot of exploited labor and those people who work to make those clothes are usually underpaid and working in really bad environments,” Diaz said.
He encourages the community to take on a more hands-on experience when gifting this holiday season. “When [people are] purchasing gifts for other people, they can make their own gifts or find things without having to buy from big conglomerates or corporations,” Diaz said.
Winter Sweeney
Winter Sweeney, junior, feels that younger demographics are susceptible to overconsumption due to their financial standpoints and easy accessibility to convenient shopping platforms. “For younger people, it’s stuff like maybe TikTok shop or Shein. It’s just affordable because obviously teens don’t have a lot of money, so if something’s more affordable, it’s like you’re tempted to buy it,” Sweeney said.
Sweeney has observed others around her struggle with overpurchasing and feels that a change in perspective is necessary in our society. “I’ll have friends who will just buy stuff, and it’s like buying a top where they only buy it because it’s on a good sale, but then mostly I never see them wear that top ever,” Sweeney said. “We need to have a mindset shift where you shouldn’t get stuff just to get it, you should get stuff when you actually need it.”
Athens Company
Beyond the initiative taken by Thousand Oaks citizens, there are also corporations working in an attempt to move towards a greener future. Rondi Guthrie, Vice President of Government Affairs for Athens Services, has a direct hand in the city’s trash service and its relationship to the public. In her last four and a half years at the company, Guthrie has seen several policies implemented in a stride towards effective waste removal and management. One of the most notable is Senate Bill 1383, which is California’s Short-Lived Climate Pollutant Reduction Strategy. The bill was intended to address the emission of greenhouse gases, such as methane. In practice, the bill targeted food waste and implemented disposal methods that minimize it. “In short, it requires businesses, schools and residents to subscribe to an organics collection service and must separate into their green organics container all of their green waste, food scraps, and food-soiled paper,” Guthrie said. Since its enactment in 2022, the bill has been moving towards its original goal of reducing organic waste by 75%
For the upcoming holiday season, Athens is proactive about the intense waste levels that will inevitably arrive with the festive cheer. “We offer Holiday Tree Recycling where we collect real holiday trees and/or foliage and compost them into a nutrient-rich soil amendment that can be used in agriculture, public parks, and landscaping,” Guthrie said. Alongside their normal trash bins, Thousand Oaks residents can place their used Christmas trees out on pickup days from the day after Christmas through the second week of January. Amidst so much purchasing and disposing of holiday goods, Guthrie and the Athens company urge Thousand Oaks citizens to be mindful of the direct route that trash takes to the landfill if it cannot be recycled or composted. “As landfills are forever, being mindful of what we buy and choosing durable goods can have a lasting impact in reducing waste,” Guthrie said.
Conclusion
Local businesses and organizations like Project ReWear, James Storehouse and Athens Services are all in efforts to recycle clothes, collect clothing donations and provide holiday tree recycling during the holiday season in an attempt to reduce the excess amounts of trash and clothing overconsumption. At NPHS, many students are also shopping more second-hand at thrift shops during the holiday season in an attempt to avoid supporting fast fashion, regardless of the cheaper prices. “When people consistently choose reusable options, it reduces the volume of waste coming into the system and supports a culture that values conservation over convenience,” Guthrie said.
