Rational View Of Function Claim: Various "New Concepts" Are Popular In The Market; Beware Of The Hype Concept Of Functional Textiles

Figure 1 and Figure 2: at present, many functional textiles have the concepts of "antiviral" and "negative ion".

In recent years, functional clothing and textiles with certain technical content have been sold well, and the concept of hype is also various. Technology is "flying into ordinary people's homes" and changing the way we dress. In this regard, experts remind that consumers need to rationally and scientifically treat various function claims, and do not be fooled by the so-called "black technology".

　　 Claim function not up to standard

In recent years, with the enhancement of consumers' awareness of health protection, textiles with health elements such as antibacterial, antiviral and negative oxygen ions are welcomed by consumers. However, according to the sampling and comparative test data, some functional textiles claim to be substandard.

A few days ago, the Beijing Consumer Association conducted a comparative test on some functional textile products, such as fast drying clothing, sun protection clothing and hats, and sunscreen ice sleeves. The results showed that among the 80 functional clothing samples of 71 brands purchased online on major e-commerce platforms, 27 samples failed to meet the requirements of relevant standards, and 13 samples had poor moisture absorption and quick drying performance, The UV protection performance of 5 samples did not meet the standard or nominal requirements, and could not play a sunscreen effect or was poor. In 2020, the comparative test results of 40 batches of functional clothing released by Ningbo Consumer Protection Committee of Zhejiang Province showed that 18 batches of samples failed to meet the standard, and the failure rate was 45%. Among them, 9 batches of hygroscopic and quick drying clothing were "annihilated", and the quick drying performance was not up to standard. In 2019, Shanghai market supervision bureau released the results of functional clothing quality spot check, and the unqualified rate was 32%.

On July 23 this year, IKEA (China) Investment Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of IKEA, was fined 1.72 million yuan by Shanghai Market Supervision Bureau for publishing false advertisements. According to the punishment decision, the "air purification" function promoted by its "gunrid" curtain product in the advertisement is based on an ideal purification result report obtained by testing curtain samples for specific target pollutants under limited test conditions. But the curtain actual use living environment condition and the test condition difference is very far, can't give full play to the curtain's air purification function effectively.

Wang Baojun, director of the national textile products quality supervision and inspection center, said in an interview with China consumer daily that the publicity of functional textiles on the market is relatively disordered, and many functional textiles can really reflect certain functionality under limited experimental conditions, but the actual use process is very different, and the product publicity gimmicks are more.

　　 Rational view of function claim

Many consumers know that the negative oxygen ions (also known as negative ions) known as "air vitamins" are beneficial to the physical and mental health of the human body. In particular, the more negative oxygen ions in the environment, the more beneficial it is to clear the lungs. For example, waterfalls, seashores, forests and other places have high concentrations of negative oxygen ions, which can reach tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands per cubic centimeter, The concentration of negative oxygen ions in urban rooms is 100 per cubic centimeter, while that in building offices is only 40-50 per cubic centimeter.

Increasing the negative oxygen ion in the living environment has become one of the standards for many consumers to buy home, bed products and clothing products. Mr. Liu, a Beijing consumer, believes that "sleeping is like keeping fit. If you sleep on bed products containing negative ions, it is just like sleeping in the forest, which is good for your health.".

In order to meet the needs of consumers, there are some textiles that claim to produce negative oxygen ions. In the flagship store of sweetlight home furnishings, a Simmons natural latex spring mattress claims that its fabric uses "seaweed carbon fiber knitted fabric, which is blended with carbonized natural seaweed, and then spun with natural cotton." seaweed carbon fiber can produce negative ions ". In addition, textiles with the concept of "anion" on the market can also be seen everywhere, such as anion bodysuit, anion fisherman's cap, anion health underwear, etc.

"Even if textiles can produce negative oxygen ions after a certain treatment, the effect on the human body is very small." according to Wang Baojun, negative oxygen ions need at least 5000 per cubic centimeter to produce benefits to the human body. The friction of specially processed textiles usually produces about 1000, rarely more than 1500. Moreover, it is unknown how much negative oxygen ions can be breathed by the human body. Moreover, if people do not exercise violently (i.e. do not rub) when wearing or covering textiles, there will be no negative oxygen ions, The so-called negative oxygen ion textiles have little effect on human body. "Consumers should treat functional textiles in a scientific and rational way." Wang Baojun cautioned that the functions of some functional textiles have evaluation criteria, such as antibacterial knitwear (F2 / t73023-2016). Antibacterial fabrics can indeed play a certain antibacterial effect, but the publicity should also be "just right", and it is not allowed to confuse bacteriostasis and sterilization.

Another example is consumers' pursuit of "cool fabric" functional clothing. Wang Baojun cautioned that this kind of clothing only has a momentary cool feeling when it is just put on. After a while, the cool feeling will disappear. If you want to solve the cooling problem, you still need to dissipate heat in time. Consumers should not be fooled by the so-called "black technology" gimmicks.

There are also clothes with anti ultraviolet function, such as skin clothes, which are often purchased by consumers. Some of them claim to contain special ingredients such as "nano meter, graphene". In this regard, Wang Baojun reminds consumers that the thickness of ordinary clothing itself is enough to have the function of anti ultraviolet. On the contrary, even if special materials are added to the clothes as thin as cicada wings, it is difficult to play the role of UV protection.

Recently, when Beijing consumer Ms. Qin bought curtain fabric products online, she found that a starberry shaped curtain window screen sold in starry tmall flagship store claimed to have antibacterial, antiviral, UV resistant, heat shielding and other functions. Also on the e-commerce platform, a polar Lafayette store sells a pair of Antarctic underpants, claiming that "the antiviral activity value reaches 99.05%".

Wang Baojun told reporters that human resistance to the virus depends on good protection and improvement of their own immunity. It is possible that the virus is not easily attached to specially processed textiles. However, if the textiles claim "anti-virus effect", it is not easy to test and evaluate the actual effect in China.

　　 Recognition problems to be solved

With the development of science and technology and the improvement of people's living standards, functional textiles are developing rapidly, and the market prospect is very broad. According to linghe.com's report on the development status and investment prospect trend of China's functional fabric industry from 2019 to 2024, the sales volume of functional textiles in China will maintain an annual growth rate of about 4%.

The clothing and textile industry attaches great importance to fabric innovation. At the China International Clothing and apparel Expo held in Shanghai in March this year, some garment enterprises have been seeking breakthroughs in functionality, hoping to meet the deep needs of consumers in terms of fabric and technology.

Professor Bai Yuling of Business School of Beijing Institute of fashion said in an interview with China consumer daily that with the change of environment and demand, consumers' demand for functional clothing is also changing, and the definition of function is also changing. The epidemic situation makes people pay more attention to their own health while worrying about the virus infection, thus increasing the new demands of antibacterial, moisture absorption and sweat absorption, anti-static and so on. At the same time, with the increase of leisure and sports, people's demand for comfort and elasticity of clothing fabrics increases, which also promotes some enterprises and fabric manufacturers to develop new functional fabrics to meet the new market demand. But some enterprises in the process of marketing, only functional as a marketing gimmick is suspected of cheating consumers. Therefore, it is suggested that relevant departments should establish standards for textiles with new functions, so that consumers can have standards to follow and numerical values to refer to in the purchase process, so as to provide consumers with better consumption experience. In addition, while strengthening the research on textiles with new functions, manufacturers should also solve the problem of certification, so that products entering the market can be recognized by consumers.

(source: China consumer daily)