Humanity is well aware by now that today’s throw-away society cannot last, especially when it comes to our clothes. But even if we have good intentions about buying less and re-wearing our garments, sometimes the design and manufacturing behind the end product can let us down.
Now, in an effort to create a long-lasting, staple garment that is not just sustainable but carbon-negative and fully traceable, Edzard van der Wyck and his partners have established Sheep Inc.
“Sheep Inc was founded this year, only launching in the second week of October,” he says.
“We wanted to take a classic wardrobe staple and try and perfect it. Creating something that feels amazing to pull on and wear that is also durable and seasonless. Basically, creating a sweater that everyone can appreciate.”
Eventually, the company has designed a classic jumper made from high quality wool in a rich, but muted colour palette – an item that can find a place in anybody’s wardrobe.
Supply chain journey
Sheep Inc’s jumpers begin their journey in New Zealand. The company only uses ZQ-certified merino wool, meaning that the farms are carefully audited from both an animal and environmental welfare standard. ZQ is said to have the highest sheep welfare standards in the world and the organisation was crucial in pushing the New Zealand government to make mulesing illegal a few years ago.
“Their ethical positioning aligned perfectly with ours,” says van der Wyck. “But working with suppliers who hit high environmental and animal welfare standards should be the minimum that new brands aim to do. This should no longer be a point of differentiation.”
The wool is then sent to be cleansed of oil and dirt in China before being spun into yarn in Italy. The yarn is knitted in Spain using Japanese 3D knitting machines to ensure less waste, and from Spain, the jumper is then sent to the customer.
Now, you may be thinking what I thought when I first learned about Sheep Inc’s supply chain: ‘Isn’t the company supposed to be carbon-negative? So, why is its supply chain spread across the world? Surely that contributes to carbon emissions?’ Well, van der Wyck states that actually, the transport and travel is less than 1% of the overall carbon footprint.
But if you are concerned about the jumper’s journey, Sheep Inc has ensured that each garment is fully traceable.
“Each sweater has a tag on it with a unique number laser engraved on it,” says van der Wyck. “The tag houses a near-field communication (NFC) chip and has a QR code on the back.”
“If you scan it with your phone (no app required), you’ll get a full breakdown of the jumper’s journey from wool shearing dates to the name of the person who hand-finished your sweater. We also include details on the carbon-impact every step of the way.
“We want to be totally transparent about how the product was made and what it required of the animals, employees and environment to get it to your door.”
What’s more, every purchase includes a little, woolly friend. So, after a sweater has been purchased, the company allocates a real sheep from one of the farms it works with to the consumer. An RFID tag in its ear allows Sheep Inc to track its day-to-day life and allows the consumer to be kept up to date with its major life events, eg what it’s up to, when it’s had a haircut and even whether it’s had lambs.
But why include a sheep? Well, the company believes that by adopting a sheep it will help the consumer connect better with where the jumper has come from. This means that hopefully the garment will be kept for decades because it has a story to it and sentimental value.
Now, although the jumper is the company’s main product, Sheep Inc was primarily founded to try and provide a solution to the current climate crisis. The number one planetary concern at the moment is reducing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere and doing this quickly, which means drastically dropping global carbon emissions.
“We believe this doesn’t just mean aiming for carbon neutrality,” says van der Wyck. “We believe we have to push it further and have a regenerative impact as a business, so Sheep Inc is carbon negative.”
To do this, the company dedicates 5% of its revenue towards biodiversity investments that have been carefully vetted by an independent advisory panel of climate change experts. This allows the business to offset around 325 kg of carbon per sweater (the equivalent of flying from London to Barcelona).
The way Sheep Inc deploys its investment is by splitting it into three areas. The first is allocated towards biodiversity projects on the farms the company works with. The second is for projects that aim to restore areas that have been impacted by over-farming, so aiming to offset the impact of the wider industry it operates in. And finally, some of the investment is used to fund projects in affected areas where carbon certification is not possible or worth pursuing.
“The Sheep Inc portfolio is being structured to ensure we have certified offsets that offset tenfold our sweater footprint,” he adds.
“Carbon-offsetting isn’t the perfect solution by any means. We ideally would like to be in a place where no offsetting has to happen. But there is a current urgent need to offset the effects of businesses’ behaviour and this is a way to put a temporary solution to something that is going to take a long time to fix.”
So far, van der Wyck says that people have responded positively to the product and Sheep Inc’s ethos. There has been a great reaction to the style, quality and comfort of the product, which has been heightened when customers learn about the background story.
From here, Sheep Inc says it has no plans to bring out any further styles as it believes there is no need and anything more could just be wasteful and unnecessary. Instead, it aims to push the textile industry to do more and do it now.
“The investments proposed from companies recently are a minimal amount of their earnings (not even of their revenue). To give you an indication, compared to a recent carbon-offsetting commitment by one of the bigger fashion houses, Sheep Inc invests around 50 times more. We really want to push the wider industry to commit a lot more.
“Additionally, our aim is to do as much as we can to equip the consumer with the correct information to enable them to make the right decisions. Being totally transparent allows customers to trust us and also allows us to be very open about where we can improve, like trying to constantly reduce our overall footprint.”
Source: www.wtin.com