Fur Sales Reflect Culture Change
Cool fashion in cold weather

Twenty years ago the fur industry was struggling to maintain the market for natural fur products, at a time when young people were reacting to animal rights and environmentalist claims that fur was not a desirable or moral choice for a fashion item. At the time, and through the 1980s and early 1990s, there were few role models in the public eye who promoted fur as a personal choice for both fashion and warmth.

The protest industry's negative messages about the product, however, have not stood the test of time, and today the Fur Council of Canada reports that fur sales to young people are sky rocketing with no limits in sight. "Fur Prices Hit Record Levels … Cool New 'Eco-Fashion' Image Driving Demand for Furs" is the lead in a press release from the Fur Council of Canada (Montreal, November 16).

Reports from the jubilant world wide fur industry are that sales of real fur garments "topped US$12.8 billion in 2005, an increase of 9% over the previous year - the fifth straight gain - with the 2006 season expected to extend the industry's strong resurgence."

The reasons for this trend are numerous. A wholly different attitude about fur has come into prevalence, coinciding with the rising popularity of certain celebrities in the music and movie industries who perform while wearing new fur fashions. These new role models claim to be promoting themselves as "eco-conscious" by wearing natural fur garments instead of the previously common "faux" furs - products produced from chemicals and petroleum based products.

Unlike the negative and dour messages formerly given by PETA, HSUS and other nay-sayers, the new messages promoting the use of fur are upbeat and positive, enhancing the image of fur wearers as supporters of the natural environment, and showcasing their economic ability to adorn themselves in style and with "eco-consciousness". Both men and women now seek to adorn themselves in this manner, expanding the market through expanding demand from both genders.

The new furs are produced by young designers for young adults, and are a far cry from the straight-laced "old lady" image of an elderly person in a full-length mink coat. The new looks in furs are flexible and diverse design modes that complement young bodies clad in blue jeans, leather boots and accessories, and include vibrant colors and textures that never saw the light of day in the last generation. Not only farmed fox and mink, but wild furs, all from abundant species, now adorn the new generation of fur wearers.

The markets are not just the Western world, but include Russia and China, whose people are more recently able and anxious to adorn themselves with the best garments for both cold weather and for cool fashion. This is culture change of a basic kind. It involves a change in the value system of a generation that has grown weary of being preached to by negative groups whose apparent motive is control of everyday life decisions about personal comfort and style.

Fur is "in" and fur is "on" literally thousands of new wearers every year. The ultimate result is a healthier climate for the conservation of wildlife and a cool new world for the newest fur customers in the global community.

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