Shein

Shein faced a RICO suit, child-labor admissions, and a congressional forced-labor probe. The deeper problem: the same opacity that powers its design-scraping insulates it from accountability - and the tariff loophole that financed its US rise was closed by executive and legislative action beginning in 2025.

Shein tests ~30 styles at once to Zara's 1–6, makes 50–300 units a run, and turns demand data back into more designs. The loop minted a $100B valuation in 2022 — and then watched it fall ~90% to about $10B by 2025 while revenue kept growing.

Shein was once reported at a $100 billion valuation; by early 2025, investors were pushing for a cut to roughly $30 billion ahead of its IPO — a further fall from the $45 billion implied by secondary-market trades in early 2024. The collapse isn't a fashion miss - it's what happens when a model built on three borrowed advantages starts having them taken back.

Everyone says Shein wins on cheap labor and a tariff exemption. The real machine is colder: it commissions 50–100 units of a style, watches the data, and reorders only what sells. The waste it dodges is inventory it never builds.