I’m just leaving for California, travelling down from San Francisco to Los Angeles from 5th to 14th November, meeting with our US clients and suppliers, specifically WordPress, whose online merchandise store we launched worldwide this summer (read more here).
Jo is ably running the Indigo office in London with the rest of the Indigo team. Fingers crossed the weather is better than in the UK at the moment!
All carbon emissions for this flight (1.95 tonnes CO2) have been offset (view PDF certificate, 477kb) via Climate Care (in conjunction with British Airways) as Indigo is committed to supporting Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).
Howies, the welsh, organic clothing, mail-order company, now has a store on London’s trendy Carnaby Street (number 42). They join American Apparel, along with the multitude of other fashion brands that populate this west London area. We’ll certainly be down to check it out soon!
If you are interested in getting organic promotional clothing, or American Apparel stock, check out the relevant pages on the Indigo Clothing site.
According to the press release:
“The Quayside Group has purchased the assets of SAF UK ltd, one of the UK’s leading supplier of ethical and organic clothing.
…
Michael Conway, Managing Director of Quayside commented “Organic clothing is great for the environment and great for the customer. It is a rapidly expanding market and we intend to make SAF the leading organic clothing brand in the UK. We will improve customer service by increasing stock levels and ensuring faster delivery times”. “
Indigo always offered SAF organic clothing but, in recent weeks, we had removed the product from our site due to concerns over stock and supply. Now that the brand is under new management, Indigo will look to reincorporate it back into our range as we always loved the quality of the SAF t-shirts.
In the mail last week an expensive looking brochure (by promotional t-shirt manufacturer standards anyway) arrived in the office. It was from a brand called edun LIVE. I must confess to never having heard of it so it could be a new venture or, the fact that the contact address is in Ireland, could mean that it could just be new for the UK market.
According to their site:
“edun LIVE is a B2B solution for anyone who wants ethically produced t-shirt blanks. Launched by Ali Hewson and Bono, our mission is to drive sustainable employment in sub-Saharan Africa through high-volume sales of blank t-shirts”
Whilst we are all for ethical apparel, I am not convinced by the product. Whilst the brochure looks good, the shirt feels a little cheap. Saying that, they never sent a price-list, something that drives me nuts! How can we assess whether the product is right to offer our customers if I don’t have pricing and stock information? Bonkers.
Latest news in from one of our coolest brands, Continental:
Continental have purchased 750 tonnes of ‘100% organic cotton - in conversion’, which is due to be harvested in October. Thereafter, from November onwards, all Continental 100% cotton garments will be manufactured using either 100% organic, or 100% organic - in conversion. Continental will be the first major wholesale manufacturer to do this, and the implications for other apparel manufacturers are huge.
Phil (Director of Continental) said “This is a major step towards going 100% organic – and by developing lasting & sustainable relationships with organic cotton farmers, we ensure our future supply of organic cotton in a time when demand might exceed supply.
Full press release: PDF
What does ‘in conversion‘ mean on an organic cotton label? Well, the Global Organic Textile Standard also enables the labelling of cotton fibre from the organic conversion period, for example ‘100% organic cotton - in conversion‘.
Cotton in conversion is grown on land which has only recently been converted to organic methods (typically less than 2 or 3 years). Therefore, although no chemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers are being used, residues may still be found in the soil. This conversion period is very difficult for farmers, who usually experience an initial drop in yield, while not being able to obtain premium organic price for their crops.
Therefore, purchasing ‘organic cotton - in conversion‘ is a great way to support farmers making the difficult transition to organic.
Continental Clothing has announced their intention to become 100% organic. In our opinion, this is a massive piece of news and again highlights the change that is going on in the organic apparel marketplace and suggests that organic cotton clothing is one step to being more mainstream within the promotional clothing, corporatewear and staff uniform industries.
Continental have purchased 750 tonnes of ‘100% organic cotton - in conversion’, which is due to be harvested in October. Thereafter, from November onwards, all Continental cotton garments will be 100% organic, or 100% organic - in conversion. Continental will be the first major manufacturer to do this, and the implications for other apparel manufacturers are enormous.
Phil (Director of Continental) said “This is a major step towards going 100% organic – and by developing lasting & sustainable relationships with organic cotton farmers, we ensure our future supply of organic cotton in a time when demand might exceed supply.”
“The cost of organic in conversion is only 3-5% more than conventional cotton, as compared to approximately 20-30% more for fully organic cotton, which means that can absorb the increase and we will not have to increase the prices of our garments.”
“I hope this gives a glimpse of what the future of the promotional industry might be, by demonstrating that it is possible to switch all cotton to organic, rather than have a few lines only of organic T-shirts in a complete wholesale collection of conventional cotton garments.”
Indigo Clothing now offers Continental’s organic range, which Katie has been adding to the organic cotton section, along with the rest of the Continental range.
There are a number of serious brands now offering good quality organic and Fairtrade products in this niche part of the promotional clothing market. Katie, who joins Indigo for one week of work experience from Wales, is adding about twenty organic cotton products to the Indigo site as I type and she’ll be writing on the Indigo blog to tell you more about what we can do in this sector.
These brands include Continental, American Apparel, Tradicraft, Epona, Howies and Okarma, all of which Indigo offers and can customise with your logo or design.
Online grocery shopping is getting the green touch according to the latest newsletter from Ocado (Ocado.com is an online supermarket in partnership with Waitrose which delivers quality groceries to your home). I quote:
“There are so many reasons why shopping at Ocado is the greener option. Each of our vans run on a blend of biodiesel and keeps up to 20 customers off the road, reducing emissions and reducing traffic in your area.
And you can help even further. If we’re already delivering to someone in your neighbourhood we’ll show you a green van icon on the slot booking page. Choosing our unique ‘Green Van’ delivery slot means you’ll feel warm inside, we’ll feel warm inside and the world will carry on being a cool place to live.
Also remember that we deliver direct from a purpose-built fulfilment centre, rather than from a supermarket. If everyone shopped this way we would eliminate the carbon emissions from traditional stores, remove heavy goods vehicles from urban areas and free up precious land.
Did you know?
We are also in the process of changing our carrier bags. They will soon be biodegradable, made with recycled plastic, so once you’ve finished using them you can recycle them or hand them back to your Ocado driver for recycling.”
Nice to see businesses taking action rather than ‘greenwashing’.
