Scroll past the algorithmically served hauls and the influencer-curated wardrobes and something unexpected is happening on TikTok. Creators are filming themselves wearing the same coat for the third consecutive winter. They are holding up half-empty moisturiser tubes and proudly showing the camera they intend to finish the product before replacing it. A 10-year-old water bottle gets a close-up. A pair of trainers, visibly battered, gets a glow-up story. This is underconsumption core – and it has quietly become the most significant counter-cultural movement in UK fashion since the original make-do-and-mend ethos of wartime Britain.
What began as a niche hashtag in mid-2024 has snowballed into a full-blown reckoning with the economics and ethics of how we dress. By June 2025, #underconsumptioncore had accumulated over 2 billion views on TikTok. Deinfluencing content – the precursor movement that told followers what not to buy – surged 158% year-over-year by early 2026. The question now is whether this is a passing aesthetic or a genuine rewiring of consumer behaviour in one of Europe’s largest fashion markets.
The Economic Engine Behind the Aesthetic
Underconsumption core did not emerge from a vacuum of environmental idealism. It was propelled, in large part, by cold financial arithmetic. The cost-of-living crisis that gripped the UK from 2022 onwards forced a generation to confront the gap between what social media told them they should own and what their bank balances permitted.
Barclays research published in March 2026 found that 55% of cost-conscious UK consumers have actively avoided new clothing and accessory purchases since 2023 – a higher share than for any other discretionary category, ahead of takeaways and meals out. The data reveals a stark generational divide: clothing and footwear spending among 16-to-24-year-olds fell 6.2% year-on-year in the final quarter of 2025, while the over-65 cohort actually increased theirs by 12.3%.
This is not simply young people being priced out of fashion. They are actively choosing a different relationship with it. A Mintel report from July 2025 found that a quarter of the youngest Gen Z consumers were buying fewer fashion items overall compared with the previous year, with a parallel rise in second-hand purchasing. The pre-loved market has become so competitive that online resale platforms, high-street retailers, and charity shops are all competing for the same pound.
“Many consumers like the idea of buying less and buying better, but many are also still pulled in by the allure of new fashions and trends,” says Neil Saunders, a retail analyst at GlobalData. “That is why fast fashion platforms like Shein are still growing. Underconsumption core has certainly gained ground on social media, but one of the important questions is how much is performative and partial versus being about consumers creating real and deep-seated changes to their buying habits.”
That tension – between the TikTok performance and the actual purchasing data – sits at the heart of the movement’s credibility.
The Fast Fashion Reckoning
To understand why underconsumption core resonates in the UK, one must grasp the scale of what it opposes. The fashion industry globally produces an estimated 92 million tonnes of textile waste annually. Between 2000 and 2015, clothing production doubled while the average number of times each garment was worn fell by 36%.
Shein has become the movement’s most potent villain. The Stand Earth 2025 Fossil Free Fashion Scorecard gave the company an F grade, revealing that its absolute emissions increased by over 170% in just two years – making it the 100th-largest emitter globally, comparable to Lebanon. Boohoo, the Manchester-headquartered operator behind PrettyLittleThing, also received an F grade for failing to disclose meaningful climate targets. In testimony before UK MPs, the company’s responsible sourcing director admitted that irrecoverable fabric waste from UK manufacturing was incinerated. The company’s sustainability score, as assessed by the SINK project, sits at just 18 out of 100.
Against this backdrop, underconsumption core functions as a moral position. When a teenager films themselves rewearing a single outfit across four different Instagram posts, they are making a statement about what fashion should mean in an era of ecological crisis.
Social Media’s Role in Normalising Restraint
The paradox of underconsumption core is that it uses the very platforms that fuelled overconsumption to dismantle it. TikTok, which perfected the haul video and the affiliate marketing model, is now the primary vehicle for content celebrating restraint.
What has shifted is the incentive structure for creators. Smaller slow-fashion accounts with modest followings are outperforming mega-influencers in both affiliate conversion and brand loyalty. Shopping-your-closet videos – in which creators show how to style existing wardrobe items in new ways – now rival new-purchase hauls in follower growth rate. The economic logic is simple: audiences trust creators who are not constantly trying to sell them something.
Hannah Toney, the founder and director of Sellier Knightsbridge, argues that this represents a fundamental change in what consumers value. “Underconsumption core focuses on sustainability and responsibility,” she says. “The movement steers society towards a more mindful consumption pattern, valuing items that are built to last and have a minimal environmental impact.”
The algorithm is responding. Videos tagged with #underconsumptioncore and #projectpan – a parallel trend focused on finishing beauty products before buying new ones – are outperforming #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt in engagement metrics. This is not lost on brands. Several major retailers reported that the underconsumption trend contributed to weaker fourth-quarter 2025 sales among Gen Z consumers. Some fashion labels have responded by reducing the number of seasonal collections and emphasising durability in their marketing.
Yet the movement also carries an inherent tension that critics are quick to identify. The carefully lit video of a ten-item capsule wardrobe is still content optimised for engagement. Posting about not consuming is, in its own way, a form of consumption – of attention, of platform metrics, of social capital. Disney Petit, the founder and CEO of LiquiDonate, makes the distinction plainly: “Circular fashion is not just about what happens after a garment is sold. It is about whether brands are changing the model that created the waste problem in the first place.”
The Accessibility Problem
Underconsumption core carries a class problem its advocates must confront honestly. The movement’s most visible proponents tend to be those who can afford to choose simplicity – who own high-quality basics that look good worn repeatedly. A Drapers survey of 2,000 UK consumers published in March 2026 found that 83% say sustainability now influences their fashion purchasing decisions. But price remains the primary barrier, with 86% prioritising quality and durability when asked abstractly – a preference that collapses under real-world budget constraints.
A ThredUp report found a telling contradiction: one in three young consumers feel addicted to fast fashion, despite 65% reporting a desire to shop more sustainably. The intent-action gap is enormous.
Advocates counter that the movement’s principles – repairing, thrifting, repurposing – are inherently accessible. Mending a torn seam costs nothing. The movement’s most radical proposition is not that people should buy expensive sustainable alternatives but that they should stop buying altogether. In a culture that has spent two decades telling consumers that identity is expressed through purchasing, that is a genuinely subversive idea.
The Brand Response and the Circular Economy
The fashion industry is being forced to adapt, though unevenly. The pre-loved economy has accelerated rapidly, with platforms such as Vinted gaining significant traction in the UK. Barclays data shows that 38% of UK consumers purchased something from a resale platform in the past year, with one in four 16-to-24-year-olds using these platforms to save money.
Some brands are leaning into this shift. Resale has moved from the margins to the mainstream, with major retailers incorporating circular models into their store experience. Others are releasing fewer, more durable collections designed to last multiple seasons. Beauty brands are offering refillable packaging to align with the principles of finishing products before replacing them.
Yet the tension between growth-oriented business models and a movement premised on buying less remains unresolved. “Brands would be wise to take a cue from the trend and emphasise things such as the durability, quality and longevity of their products,” notes GlobalData’s Saunders. But emphasising longevity in marketing copy is one thing; restructuring supply chains built on volume is quite another.
The UK government has begun to take notice. The Fashion Act, proposed in early 2026, would require large fashion companies operating in the UK to map their supply chains, set emissions reduction targets, and take responsibility for post-consumer waste.
A Cultural Shift, Not a Hashtag
The most compelling evidence that underconsumption core represents something more durable than a TikTok trend comes from the generational data. Gen Z savings rates in the UK have increased relative to where millennials stood at the same age, despite operating in worse economic conditions. This generation is more likely to research products extensively before purchasing. They are the demographic driving resale platforms to record growth. They are, by the available evidence, actually buying fewer things.
An Impressive Times analysis from May 2026 put the movement’s implications plainly: “Rather than measuring value through accumulation, underconsumption core encourages consumers to make thoughtful purchasing decisions and appreciate what they already own.” Financial experts note that spending more selectively makes it easier to manage debt and build toward longer-term goals – a practical benefit that transcends any aesthetic trend.
The question, ultimately, is whether underconsumption core can survive its own success. Every cultural movement that gains sufficient traction to be named and branded risks being absorbed by the very consumer machinery it opposes. The minimalist capsule wardrobe becomes a product category. The thrift-store find becomes a curated aesthetic. The refusal to participate becomes, paradoxically, a form of participation.
What remains, stripped of hashtags and trend-cycle packaging, is a genuinely important question that underconsumption core has forced into the mainstream: what do we actually need, and who benefits when we mistake wanting for needing? The fashion industry – worth over £60 billion annually in the UK alone – has every incentive to ensure that question remains abstract. A generation raised on haul videos and affiliate links is, slowly and imperfectly, making it concrete.
