Eileen Fisher started her namesake brand in 1984 for a very personal
reason, she was having trouble finding simple, comfortable and fashionable
clothes. She started off by creating four pieces, even though she couldn’t saw,
was encouraged by $3000 worth of orders, which allowed her to expand her
collection to eight items, which has continued to grow from then on.
In 1997, the brand developed Social
Consciousness department to tackle not only environmental but social
problems facing the world as well. The department focused on practicing business
responsibly with absolute regard for human rights, guiding the product and
practice toward sustaining the environment and supporting women to be full
participants in society.
The brand’s first
sustainable action began by taking small steps towards making clothes that
helped versus hurt the planet. The brand started using organic cotton and
looking for natural fibers that would encourage communities
around the world instead of destroying them. The brand believes in measuring
performance through the quadruple bottom line: supply chain, financial, environmental
and employees.
In 2009, Eileen Fisher started using Blue Sign
Technologies, a Swiss company that audits the textile process from raw material
to finished product to measure its impact on the environment. They rate all of
their fabrics with 3.8 being the benchmark for eco-preferred textiles (with a
top score of 10). They assess the chemistry (pre-treatment, printing, dyeing
and finishing) which accounts for 40% of the score and the actual fibre which
accounts for 60% of the score. For Fall 2018, 66% of projected units were made
with eco-preferred materials (which is an increase of 19% compared with same
time last year).
The reason for their success in becoming sustainable,
is because they convinced their customers that buying sustainable products
doesn’t have to cost more. They managed to achieve this by focusing on costing,
absorbing some costs and increasing the margin on some units to balance the two
out. Another pillar of their success is their intangible brand value- while
trying to do the right thing by being sustainable, their customers are given
something they want to come back to.
Eileen Fisher together with her staff created a Vision
2020. The vision’s plan is to create an industry where human rights and
sustainability are not effects of a particular initiative, but the cause of a
business well run. In addition, the plan is to focus on social and
environmental injustices that are not unfortunate outcomes but reason to do
things differently.
Not all of the clothes are Blue Sign approved, but the
goal is that all of the products will be by year 2020. Eileen Fisher helps the brand
stay true to its values and in 30 years, Eileen Fisher’s aim is to be a
powerful force for change in the world, and one can say they are well on their
way!
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