Brands chasing the Green Pound
I may be being cynical but today's news here seems to be yet more jumping on the green band wagon. Timberland has bought Howies, the ethical Welsh outdoor clothing company. It's big news in the ethical world as Howies have established a solid reputation for using recycled materials and giving a percentage of its profits to environmental projects. Howies has been particularly good at extolling its green values on its website and I just hope that Timberland takes note of this. Co-founder, David Hieatt says that he and his partner will remain in control of the company but it will be interesting to see how far it can retain its independence. Too often following a takeover, company's lose their identities and uniqueness within the market. In Timberland's defence, it already has an enviornmental policy in place and to build on this, it would do itself no harm at all by adapting some of the successful initiatives, which its new sibling has so successfully run in the past.
1 comments:
Ben
How sad.... I love Howies and I'm a huge fan of what they do but I always worry when I hear about multi-nationals taking over small enterprises. Surely they get swallowed?
I first heard about Howies from Neil Crofts when he's left Razorfish and was researching what is now his "Authentic" service and books.
My favourite Howies T shirt...."Nandrolone, the choice of winners".
I give lots of people their T shirts because they are brilliantly irreverent! I wanted them to do a special for me called "Work Hard: Row Home" but they told me how many I'd need to order before it became commecially viable... and even I don't have that many rowing friends!
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