France’s so-called “anti-fast fashion” law has hit a snag.

Writing in an April 15 reaction, the European Commission said that Loi Violland—a bill designed to curb overconsumption by regulating the environmental impacts of low-cost, high-volume brands—runs afoul of the EU single market, violates existing e-commerce regulations and is otherwise “incompatible with Union law.”

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The letter argued that Loi Violland’s restrictions on advertising that encourage overconsumption violate the “country of origin” principle under EU law, which requires that a digital service provider should only be subject to the regulations of the member state where it is established. Imposing French-specific bans and penalties on companies headquartered in other EU states—such as Ireland, where both Shein and Temu run their European operations—oversteps its jurisdiction.

Furthermore, because the EU is rolling out its own Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation, the European Commission warned that France’s mandatory “eco-score” and financial penalties could result in policy fragmentation, contributing to a patchwork of rules that would complicate cross-border trade. The 27-member bloc is also developing a digital product passport, along with other textile sustainability standards that could be upended by France’s unilateral legislation.

Despite a general Europe-wide shift toward deregulating sustainability, France has doubled down on its need to impose stricter oversight on companies like Shein and Temu out of a combination of environmental urgency, consumer safety concerns and a desire to safeguard its own struggling domestic textile industry. Named after French politician Anne-Cécile Violland, Loi Violland was unanimously approved by the National Assembly in 2024 and by the Senate in 2025.

Its goal: to impose an environmental surcharge of up to 10 euros (nearly $12) per item by 2030, outlaw advertising for ultra-fast fashion purveyors and require mandatory environmental impact disclosures.

France’s pressure on Shein intensified after a late-2025 scandal involving the listing of “childlike” sex dolls and illegal weapons on its website—just as the Chinese-founded e-tailer opened its first permanent location in Paris. Inspections by French customs of 320,000 Shein parcels at Charles de Gaulle Airport later found a 25 percent non-compliance rate, triggering a judicial push by the French government to suspend the platform for three months.

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The Paris Judicial Court ultimately rejected the suspension in December 2025—a decision upheld by the Court of Appeal in March 2026—ruling that a total blackout was “disproportionate” because Shein took timely action in removing the illicit listings and voluntarily tightened controls.

With the European Commission weighing in, however, Loi Violland is now in a state of limbo for at least the next four to six months as Paris and Brussels work to hammer out a compromise. Under the EU’s notification procedure, France is currently bound by a mandatory “standstill period” while it reviews the European Commission’s objections and adjusts the bill’s scope to address the points of contention. Other alternatives are for Paris to withdraw the law entirely or to ignore the European Commission and provoke a lawsuit from the European Court of Justice, rendering it unenforceable for French retailers.

Things could go in any direction, according to Baptiste Carriere-Pradal, co-founder and director of 2B Policy, an ESG consultancy based in Amsterdam.

“France could make several changes compared to its first draft, for instance, abandoning the idea of taking money from ‘bad’ producers to reward ‘good’ ones could be dropped,” he wrote on LinkedIn. “However, France and the EU Commission don’t see eye to eye on several points regarding the EU’s Digital Services Act and its enforcement.”

Some of this hinges on what hasn’t been said, too.

“In parallel, in a move to support their application, France asked the French PRO, Refashion, in January 2026 to come forward with a proposition for eco-modulation targeting ultra-fast fashion,” Carriere-Pradal said. “What has been proposed is not yet publicly communicated.  As the EU Commission has stressed, the output of this work could be key for the next steps of this milestone legislation.”

In February, Serge Papin, France’s minister for small and medium-sized businesses, declared a “year of resistance” for online marketplaces like Shein because of the unfair competition they posed to French retailers.

Speaking to TV station TF1, Papin said that Shein presented a “disturbance to public order” through non-compliance that he described as “systemic.”

“The platform that markets the products bears responsibility, and for the moment, it is not responsible for the products it sells,” he said. “There are double standards: when a physical store puts products on its shelves, it is responsible for them; if it sells non-compliant products, it removes them and it is shut down.”