To ask why SHEIN clothes have increased in price?

EBay https://ebay.io/m/dcnTB5
cape - white sheet from charity shop and use sticky hem stuff to hem
You’re lazy.

Drama - you should be able to hire costumes. Plenty of stuff on vinted too.

Shein and temu are utter shit that allow modern slavery.

I’m not a dress maker, you don’t need to be. You can use scissors and make a couple of stitches. I’ve just told you. Look online. It’s not hard ,schools do this all the time.

Without derailing about drama productions - you do what we did before Shein was a thing. Cobble together as much as you can from what you have. Put a shout out on every single local Facebook group asking for anyone who can donate/lend. Look into renting the few things you can't source other ways. Accept that unless you have a west end budget, the costumes are not going to be perfect, and that's OK.

And again…how? I am not a dressmaker. I abhorred textiles at school and refused to learn how to sew. I do not know how. It might be ok if you know someone who can. I don’t and I don’t have a sewing machine or a sewing box or anything like that.

Re dirndl. Cut the sleeves off any old tight fitting dark coloured blouse put it over another short sleeved light coloured blouse and tie an apron round it( or make an apron out of an old sheet).Not hard.

As i said I already scoured vinted for the funeral dress and a 1930s church dress.

And school staff have all the time in the world 🤔

You have old sheets. You don’t need to buy expensive materials to make things. You look around what you have at home. You can make flowers out of all sorts of things.

People up and down the country do this all the time.

Vinted?

Then the production isn't viable with the budget you've been given.

Lots of countries have realised just how toxic and awful the shitey Shein business model is and how fast fashion is killing the planet with its production techniques and waste. The EU and US imposed tariffs on small packages coming from China from companies like Shein and Temu and this has affected profits. https://nltimes.nl/2026/08/10/half-dutch-ordering-shein-temu-less-frequently-since-eus-import-tariff So prices rise.

Unfortunately the UK is not following suit until 2028.

👏🏼🤣

Because they've hooked millions of customers in and know that we are creatures of habit, same as Primark did. Still unethical, still paying their workers jackshit and still full of nasty chenmicals

This.
it’s just starting with the motor trade now, huge subsidies for Chinese companies to move to manufacturing vehicles. At some point those subsidies will stop and it will be survival of the fittest for the brands.

I just read this too. He lays out in detail how items were made with such care and skill, now largely gone.

Why can't you make them? I cut my teeth doing costumes for GCSE drama out of old costumes, bedsheets, and charity shops.

So I don’t have time or the raw material to “just make them” that would require a visit to our nearest big city (about an hours drive each way) to find material. Which would cost way more than £30 for just one dress. If I had a sewing machine, and I knew how to use it, fantastic, but I don’t and I can’t even sew on a button.
So I’m still short a dirndl dress and a white cloak/cape and I need some false hair pieces and some accessories (fake flowers particularly - as the ones we have in stores are now extremely old and no longer look good: I tried steaming them last week and the petals just wilted they are awful)

Absolutely!

Cheap tat has lowered our understanding of quality.
We expect cheap prices.
Our high street is ruined. No customers, no shops.

No choice now but to pay higher prices for rubbish. (Or buy vintage/seek out decent British brands).

Interesting that the high street in Europe hasn’t suffered in the same way.

Make them. Schools continuously do productions very much like making stone soup with zero budget. You send alerts re specific items and then use your initiative to make what you can’t borrow out of what you have.

What are the alternatives please?
I have a production coming up, I need a dirndl, a couple of false hair pieces, a wrap around white cloak, some flower hair pieces and a bunch of accessories. I have priced them up on shein and Temu at just under £30 for the lot, but if there is an alternative that is just a cheap, I would love to know. (I scoured vinted for the black funeral dress and my 1930s church dress so I have already secured them)

The cost of manufacture and infrastructure has risen. Materials, machinery, improved health and safety regulation, shipping, labour: living standards and expectations in the places these things are manufactured have increased exponentially over the past couple of decades, economies are better, fewer people are willing to work in factories being paid pennies. All this is reflected in sale price.

I’ve just read Less by Patrick Grant. It’s horrific what these companies are doing to the planet and society .

Good. Nobody should be buying from Shein, BooHoo, Temu etc and nobody needs the huge amount of disposable clothing people buy. Such companies are horrific on so many levels

Much less, better quality clothes that aren’t made out of plastic are what we should all be buying.

It’s cheaper to buy one clothing item that lasts years than a continual diet of plastic crap that ends up in landfill.

Agree. Bought a Zara dress off Vinted and had to check the label didn't say Shein. I chucked it in the bin. Thin, unlined see through rubbish.

I wouldn't be caught dead supporting Shein. There are other things beyond 'cheap'. Not only is it not good for you physically, but supporting something that is well-known for slave work especially kids does not sit well with me.