|
|
Believe it or not, the idea for Maggie's Organics
began with an Organic Tortilla chip. We were in
the food business, busy selling both blue and yellow
corn tortilla chips, when one of our farmers recommended
adding cotton to the crop rotation to improve the
quality of the corn. His experiment worked. However,
his cotton yielded a crop and we were expected to
sell it!
After learning the harsh facts
of conventional cotton cultivation and garment manufacturing,
we began making garments a different way - using
our farmer's Organic cotton. We started with socks,
and then added tee shirts: simple products that
would encourage the use of Organic fibers in order
to convert as many acres of land as possible from
conventional to organic farming methods.
Once we were involved in the sewing side of the
apparel industry, we began experiencing the same
problems that all apparel companies complain about
– late orders and poor quality. That is when we
began to spend more time in our factories, trying
to figure out why these problems recurred. This
is when we realized who really sews the clothes
we all buy: poor and often under-educated workers,
mostly women. These women are paid by the piece,
forcing them to stay at the same repetitive jobs
for years in order to support their families, and
in turn damaging both their bodies and minds. They
are completely disenfranchised from the consumers
who wear their clothes, and the companies whose
labels they sew.
We became impassioned to find or to create an alternative
to this broken system. By partnering with Jubilee
House, a community development organization, and
pledging our sewing contracts, we were instrumental
in the creation of the Fair Trade Zone, a 100% worker-owned
Sewing Co-Operative in Nueva Vida, Nicaragua. The
co-op became the first worker-owned cooperative
in the world to gain Free Trade Zone status!
Our partnership with The Fair Trade Zone has inspired
us to pursue other cooperative projects, and to
develop relationships with contractors who honor
workers’ rights:
 |
We are now pledging yarn
contracts to Genesis, a 100% worker-owned
spinning mill that JHC
is developing next to the Fair Trade Zone
in Nicaragua. This venture is helping us rekindle
a dyeing cotton industry in Nicaragua, which
in turn is supporting cooperative farmer groups.
|
|
We also now work with
CIA Textiles, a 60-year old family run knitting,
dyeing and sewing factory in San Jose Costa
Rica, started by a Jewish immigrant from Poland
sent by his family at age 14 to escape the
Nazi invasion. Thanks to the vision and compassion
of this man, CIA has an impeccable record
of setting up a democratic worker’s association,
paying at least 15% above average wages, and
instituting many special worker programs.
|
|
Last year, we formed a
partnership with Molly Hemstreet and the Center
for Participatory Change, and helped form
a new cooperative in North Carolina called
Opportunity Threads.
This co-op started with a line of stuffed
animals which are make using our excess and
irregular socks and fabrics. Opportunity Threads’
designers are very creative, and they are
now making products for several other companies
as well. |
We continue to develop new products with these partners,
the latest of which is a line of knit apparel for
spring 2010, which is certified to a new Fair
Labor Practices standard.
We have learned much through our 18 year history,
each lesson making us more and more confidant of
the sustainability of our business practices.
|
|
|
|
