Is supply chain management in the fashion industry sustainable?

The fashion industry faces major challenges due to short lifecycles and demand volatility. However, improved planning and inventory optimization can significantly reduce waste and overproduction. The economic and environmental costs of unsold stock are closely linked in fashion: each unit produced beyond demand consumes raw materials, energy and logistics capacity, and often ends up discounted, destroyed or landfilled. Probabilistic forecasting and dynamic buffers reduce that overproduction by sizing commitments to actual demand uncertainty rather than optimistic point estimates. The same approach also helps brands react faster to early sell-through signals, so reorder decisions reflect reality rather than the assumptions made at the start of the season.