A Deep Dive Into Shein: Part 2
- Zevez Zalay
- Nov 17, 2025
- 5 min read
Timeline of how the Shein empire revolutionized the fast-fashion industry
Zevez ZalayNovember 15th, 2025, 11:37 pm ET
Related Topics
Shein, fast fashion, overconsumption, overconsumption glamorization, capitalism, China, Kenya, landfills, water pollution, carbon emissions, Shein hauls, human rights, climate change, greenwashing, Xu Yangtian, textile waste, textile pollution, micro influencers, eCommerce algorithms, online retail, women’s fashion
Before 2020, Shein was a brand that most of us had never heard of before. When we thought of “fast-fashion,” many of us would think of the big brick-and-mortar retailers that we would see in shopping malls, like American Eagle, Forever 21, H&M, Nordstrom, and Macy’s. However, the online-only fashion giant, Shein, went from the prom dress market to completely revolutionizing the fast-fashion industry (Roberts, 2022). Shein’s founder, Xu Yangtian, has a background and education, not in the fashion, retail, or business industry, but specifically in algorithms (Roberts, 2022). Thus, he applied his skills to women’s online fashion and changed online retail into a cheap, fast, and customized experience.
Marketing Strategy
While to some, applying SEO tactics to online women’s retail seemed genius, in China, the strategy of letting the consumers dictate what products a company puts out through the use of analyzing data already existed, and is known as the Consumers to Market Model (C2M) (The China Project, 2021). The process involves pushing products out there and seeing what consumers bite, noticing the similarities to other products they already have out there, and tailoring the next batch of items to their former conclusions about the data (The China Project, 2021; Roberts, 2022). Most of the targeted consumers are those who are in the middle to upper class, tend to be white, women, and are primarily from the United States (Roberts, 2022; IBISWorld, 2025). The United States is huge for Shein and others in the global apparel manufacturing industry, and with 330 million consumers to bank on, it makes it an easy choice to target.
Thus, not only is there genius algorithmic work behind the scenes of Shein’s eCommerce website, but their consumer targeting and segmentation all play a role in how they maximize the size of each sale. They aim to target individuals with disposable income who are willing to buy more than they need, but not so much that they start looking towards more luxury brands for higher-quality products.
The start of Shein
The story of Shein dates back to 2008, with a company known as Nanjing Dianwei Information Technology (NDIT) that Xu Yangtian founded with two others, known as Wang Xiaohu and Li Peng (Graham, 2023). The trio worked out of a cramped office, and as Charlie Graham puts it:
[They] experimented with selling different products, tested distribution strategies, and began perfecting the high-volume, low-margin model that would eventually become SHEIN’s trademark. Xiaohu said that NDIT explored clothing and fashion, reasoning that a Chinese company could take advantage of local manufacturing in much the same way as Western brands did. (Graham, 2023).
Back in 2012, Xu Yangtian picked the name SheInside, as he had found previous positive remarks towards the name, as he intended it to come across as, “she’s an insider to fashion”. SheInside was primarily an online site for dress shopping, prior to the switch to incorporate all women’s clothing. Alongside the addition of other product categories, in 2015, he ended up shortening the name to Shein and tailoring their brand marketing around that, which gave a more cohesive look to the company (The China Project, 2021; Roberts, 2022; Graham, 2023).
Things were pretty steady for the online retail site until 2020, when the BBC claims there was a huge shift in the company’s awareness, popularity, downloads, and revenue (Thomas, Jones, & Hooker, 2024). This is because not only were people finding joy through online shopping during the pandemic, but Shein leaped on the growth of TikTok during the same time. Utilizing organic influencer marketing and celebrity endorsements on the platform (Deigton, 2023; Graham, 2023; Thomas et al, 2024). However, the growth for the fast fashion giant didn’t stop at the pandemic; it was really only the beginning of their rapid growth.
The growth of Shein
After the company’s founding story, there is much left to the imagination. In a YouTube video titled “The Story of Shein,” The China Project states,
the brand is practically a black box for media and investors. Shein is generally said to be worth over 15 billion, but after its latest funding round, a Chinese tech blog reported the company to be worth around 46 billion which is roughly the valuation of Ebay however, the article was promptly wiped from all Chinese media sites at the company to the hess a representative of the company also reached out to us to tell us the number is wrong but declined to provide an alternative number. Shein refuses to publicize its investors, but we know that industry veterans like Jafco Asia and IDG Capital, along with private equity titans Sequoia and Tiger Global, are all confirmed backers, yet none have come forward about the company. (The China Project, 2021)
While Shein is not a completely private company, as they have debated going on the London Stock Exchange (Thomas et al., 2024), they don’t exercise much transparency at all. This leads to one of the many reasons why their unethical labor practices and environmental impacts can slip under the radar for many, and they conceal much more than what slips through the cracks and into the eyes of the media. Thus, for many consumers like 17-year-old Michaela, the statements the company makes about improving their company's impact are enough to keep them filling up their shopping carts (Thomas et al., 2024).
In the next part of “A Deep Dive Into Shein”, we will be looking at the responses the company has made on behalf of what goes on behind the scenes of their e-commerce website. Analyzing how these responses ensure less informed consumers come back to shop, and how other responses might be tarnishing their brand.
Resources
IBISWorld. (2025). Products & markets — I1311: Fishing & hunting equipment manufacturing in Australia [Industry report]. IBISWorld. Retrieved November 16, 2025, from https://my-ibisworld-com.ezproxy.rit.edu/gl/en/industry/C1311-GL/products-and-markets
The China Project. YouTube. (2022, April 27). The Story of Shein. [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0D1fjHUiD4
Roberts, A. [Prime Video]. (2022). Inside the SHEIN Machine [Film]. Prime Video. https://www.primevideo.com/region/na/detail/Inside-the-Shein-Machine/0Q4S1LAZ7XZCD9MTW6Q8J1XEY4
C. Graham. Contrary Research. (2023). Shein — company profile. Contrary. Retrieved November 16, 2025, from https://research.contrary.com/company/shein
J. Deighton. Harvard Library Publishing. (2023, April 25). How Shein and Temu conquered fast fashion and forged a new business model. Harvard Business School Working Knowledge. Retrieved November 16, 2025, from https://www.library.hbs.edu/working-knowledge/how-shein-and-temu-conquered-fast-fashion-and-forged-a-new-business-model
D. Thomas, L. Jones, and L. Hooker. BBC News. (2024, June 7). The Rise and Rise of a Fashion Giant Shein. BBC. Retrieved November 16, 2025, from https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp991n2v0m2o
Financial Times. (2021, December 8). Shein: the Chinese company storming the world of fast fashion. Financial Times. https://www.ft.com/content/a99a702c-c232-4460-acd7-8078f5bac503
YouTube. (2022, May 10). [Video titled by uploader] [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phWwimM2DQk
I really like how clearly you laid out Shein's history and the role algorithms played in its rise. I hadn't realized the company's foundation was so tied to data driven decision making, and it makes me wonder how much of the broader fashion industry has shifted toward algorithmic forecasting. Your point about timing also resonated with me, the pandemic created a perfect storm where people were stuck at home, TikTok was exploding, and Shein had endless cheap options to browse through with the extra time. It feels like a mix of right place, right time, with the pandemic and the convenience of the digital platform.
This was a really interesting breakdown. I didn't know how fast Shein went from an unknown company to a major force in fast fashion, and it was informative on the way you explained each growth stage. I also didn’t realize how much of their success came from algorithms and consumer data, and it makes me even more curious about how much of the industry is shifting in that direction. I think that the lack of transparency you highlighted is especially concerning, because it shows how easy it is for a company to grow this fast without the public really understanding what’s happening.