Textile and clothing industry turnover in the European Union 2010-2021

A study measuring the textile and clothing industry turnover in EU Member States from 2010 to 2021 found that year-over-year turnover gradually increased up until 2018, after which a decline started, exacerbated by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in 2020. In 2021, turnover in the industry improved slightly from the previous year, to 147 billion euros. However, this was still considerably less than the 2010 value.

Consumer spending and sourcing of clothing in the EU

In 2018, UK consumers spent the most on clothing out of all EU-28 consumers surveyed. In 2018, UK households spent 65.4 billion euros. Germany, Italy, France and Spain rounded out the top five countries for consumer expenditure on clothing. In 2018, China was the leading supplier of clothing to the European market and imported around 26.83 million euros worth of clothing that year. Following China, Bangladesh imports the second highest amount of clothing to Europe. In 2018, 16.35 million euros worth of clothing was imported from Bangladesh. From 2015 to 2018, the amount of clothing imports from China to Europe has been decreasing. Whereas the imports from Bangladesh to Europe have been increasing.

EU exports of clothing globally

The EU is also a major player in clothing exports throughout the world. Italy’s clothing export market is the largest out of any EU country. In 2019, Italy exported 26.18 billion US dollars’ worth of clothing. Germany came in second place and exported 24.43 billion U.S. dollars of clothing in the same year.