How confident can you really be in what you're buying?

Analysis: Consumers now navigate a marketplace where trends, novelty and online influence mean safety and quality can slip as speed and low costs dominate

By Catarina Marvão, UCD

Trust is an invisible ingredient in every purchase. We assume that what we buy is safe, that descriptions are accurate, and that companies play by the rules. But a series of investigations, product recalls and concerns around online shopping platforms suggest that this trust is coming under pressure

Recent enforcement actions by Ireland's Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC)—including cases involving Boots Ireland and Lifesyle Sports, and warnings to fast-fashion retailers such as Shein —have put a spotlight on a growing question for shoppers: how confident can we really be in what we’re buying?

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From RTÉ Radio 1's News At One, Irish Times' Consumer Affairs Correspondent, Conor Pope reports on Boots' plea of guilty to breaching legislation aimed at protecting consumers from misleading prices during sales periods

The true price of cheap clothing

Few companies illustrate the changing retail landscape more clearly than Shein, the ultra-fast-fashion giant whose growth has reshaped how (and how often) we buy clothes. Economics 101 posits that when prices decrease, consumers are better off, but Shein appears to deliver exactly that. Its clothing often costs a fraction of traditional high-street prices, which is understandably appealing to households facing rising living costs.

I’m not immune to that appeal myself. Like many people, I’ve occasionally debated whether to place an order: the prices are strikingly low and the range is vast. But that hesitation is also a reminder that price alone doesn’t tell the whole story.

Many goods carry negative externalities, costs that don’t show up on the price tag but still have to be paid somewhere. In fast fashion, these include environmental damage, microplastic pollution and the impact of short-lived clothing on waste systems. Labour conditions across global supply chains add another layer of concern. When these wider costs aren’t reflected in what consumers pay, cheap goods can look like excellent value while quietly creating larger future costs for society.

From RTÉ Lyric FM's Culture File, fashion researcher, Amelia O'Mahony-Brady on the rise of Shein's hyper-fast, data-driven fashion

Cheap today, less competition tomorrow?

Ultra-fast-fashion also raises questions about long-run competition. Shein’s business model combines speed, massive scale and extremely low prices, advantages that many domestic or European retailers simply cannot match.

If this continues, it may push some competitors out of the market entirely. Consumers enjoy bargains in the short term, but fewer rivals can mean less choice, less innovation and less competitive pressure in the future. The risk is not predatory pricing, but the structural imbalance between global platforms and smaller local retailers.

How demand for cheap goods is now created

Another shift concerns how we decide what to buy. Traditional economic models assume companies respond to what consumers want, but platforms like Shein increasingly help shape those wants. Algorithms constantly feed users new designs. Influencers showcase haul videos. Micro-trends come and go within days. The CCPC recently reported that almost 30% of Black Friday shoppers say they are swayed by influencers.

From RTÉ Radio 1's Morning Ireland, CCPC research found that 40% of Irish consumers intend to take part in Black Friday sales

Buying decisions are increasingly driven by mood, novelty or social pressure rather than necessity. This feeds into Ireland's wider waste challenge: we generate around 63,000 tonnes of textile waste each year, much of which comes from clothing that was bought cheaply and worn only a handful of times. Low prices can encourage overconsumption just as easily as they can support household budgets.

The race to the bottom

When one major retailer competes mainly on price and speed, others often feel they must follow. This can trigger a race to the bottom, where companies may cut corners on quality, durability or oversight to stay competitive.

The CCPC’s recent alerts show the real-world consequences. In October, it revealed that over 25,000 unsafe toys were removed from the Irish market since Halloween 2024, many of them purchased online. Another recent warning highlighted concerns about Labubu dolls and "blind boxing", which combine product safety issues with marketing tactics designed to encourage repeat purchases. These examples aren’t about fashion, but they reflect a wider pattern where safety and quality can slip when speed and low costs dominate.

From RTÉ Radio 1's. Morning Irland, European Commission gives Shein one month to respond to probe into practices

The role of enforcement

Ireland is now a central player in regulating these markets. When Shein opened its Europe, Middle East and Africa headquarters in Dublin in May 2023, it brought responsibility as well as jobs. In early 2025, the CCPC co-led an EU-wide investigation into Shein, asking it to fix practices that may breach consumer law, such as covering transparency, product safety, cancellation and returns, and compliance with the Digital Services Act. The company has committed to making changes, but the case underscores a broader point: low prices only benefit consumers when proper regulatory oversight is in place.

This is an information asymmetry problem. If consumers can’t tell a safe product from an unsafe one, or a reliable seller from a risky one, the market can become what’s known as a 'market for lemons', where bad products push out good ones because consumers lose trust in the difference. Shein’s rapid production cycle, with thousands of new items added daily, makes consistent oversight difficult even with the best intentions.

Can we buy with confidence?

From a policy perspective, the challenge is finding balance. Regulators must protect consumers and safeguard competition without stopping innovation. Retailers must keep prices reasonable without undermining quality or transparency. And consumers must navigate a digital marketplace where trends, novelty and online influence play an ever larger role.

From RTÉ News, Ticketmaster and Eir prompted most consumer complaints to CCPC in 2024

Economics tells us that low prices are good for consumers—but only when the market itself is healthy. If cheap goods encourage overconsumption, fuel a decline in quality or weaken long-term competition, the benefits become much less clear. Trust, in this sense, is not just a moral idea, but an economic necessity.

The Shein investigation, the CCPC’s recent enforcement actions and the rising number of unsafe products all point to the same conclusion: the real question for Irish consumers is no longer simply whether we can buy more for less—but whether we can buy with confidence.

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Dr. Catarina Marvão is an Assistant Professor in the School of Business at UCD, affiliated Faculty at the Stockholm School of Economics and a Research Affiliate at the Central Bank of Ireland.

The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ