Long Read
The campaign arm of No Sweat – Kim Ford
common cause with sweatshop workers everywhere, holding large corporations to account, and help stamp out the sweatshops system.
Our t shirt Project is a campaign in itself. It offers a example of how the global garment industry could (and should) operate. We source organic cotton T-shirts from factories that put workers fi rst, and the money generated by clothing sales is used to fund our campaign to fi ght sweatshop labour and support workers groups around the world.
The music industry has a close connection to the garment industry. Band t shirts are souvenirs fans treasure, but they shouldn’t be made at the cost of workers’ rights.
Q
Is there now more consumer understanding of your aims, due to the growing trend in society towards sustainability? A. There’s been a defi nite shift in public consciousness towards sustainability. And with that, there has been a drive towards ‘ethical fashion’. There’s been a response by the industry to try and to some extent make some genuine change. There are
www.printwearandpromotion.co.uk
companies out there doing good things, but there’s also been a massive shift to create a PR stunt to make it look like there’s been some changes – it’s greenwashing for sure. It’s often the case that you’ll fi nd with big corporations that every time there’s an organic range, they’ll promote that in a big way. But what they don’t tell you is that they have a very non-organic range. Shouldn’t you just be focusing on making everything ethical and sustainable? That’s very much where our attitude came from. If we’re going to create a project to tackle this industry, then we have to look at it and try and say, okay, what are the issues? How do we make sure we don’t fall into that trap? And where are we going from here?
Q
Please explain the business breakdown and how you focus on retail and wholesale. A. The retail side is very much campaign t shirts at present, but it’s something we’d like to develop. But the retail space is hard to be successful because you’re selling individual units – it’s much harder – so we use it more as a campaigning arm of the business. We’re focused more on the wholesale market. All the attention is focused on the big name brands on the high street, very little is focused on the wholesale brands. So we thought we’d challenge the industry on the wholesale side and say to companies you can do better.
It’s possible to do to do what you’re doing in a sustainable ethical way, and we’re going to prove it. And so, if we can do it with volunteers, then you as a multi-million-dollar company can do this overnight. It’s
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