The funny thing about being a fan of a musician is how much of it can be detached from the music itself via a focus on merchandise and streaming numbers. Years ago, I swore off impulse buying merchandise due to the low quality and high prices of most fan stores. Even more strongly felt, however, was the sense that I was just purchasing another thing to add to a landfill. The resources used to create this shirt or that hoodie were treated with less gravity than I thought they should be. As I grew in my sustainability work and gained more knowledge of the textile industry, this disinterest in purchasing short-term goods grew as well.
There is an immense amount of textile waste in the world. The new materials, supply chain structures, and manufacturing technology that developed over the decades has created an understanding of fabric as disposable. The result has been a waste of resources throughout the supply chain and an accompanying destruction of people and the planet.
People need to have clothes. Indeed, there are even business cases for having merchandise. Building a consumer identity, casual marketing, an additional source of income – merchandise is not created for no reason. The challenge is this: how can a company that wants to be sustainable create merchandise that is more than a near future landfill placeholder?
The company Everywhere is stepping in as an answer. Founded in 2019, Everywhere Apparel has two revenue streams: they are a for-profit textile recycler and they sell clothing. Their value proposition is their extraction of cotton from discarded fabric and the creation of new clothes, including the merchandise for Chappell Roan and the media company Atmos. By keeping these fabrics in circulation, Everywhere is ensuring that new resources don’t need to be used. What we have already made as a planet can be reused to create even more value.
Everywhere is building an essential part of the sustainable economy: circularity. Circular economies keep resources in use for as long as possible, only returning them to nature when all value has been used and the waste can be used to regenerate said nature. By using recycled cotton, Everywhere takes advantage of the resources like water that have already been incorporated into the fiber creation process. Everywhere’s recycled cotton uses no water in production, as well as no dyes, chemicals, or microplastics. By offering both recycling and clothing production, Everywhere is able to complete the resource loop for its clients. In an email with Irys Kornbluth, COO of Everywhere, she relayed that “there is a huge impact to be made leveraging the high volumes of existing textile waste to decarbonize the industry. We focus on cellulosic fibers like cotton to mitigate microplastics pollution accumulating because of synthetic and blended textile fibers.”
What can we take away from the team’s work at Everywhere Apparel? Firstly the company demonstrates the importance of an impact business model. Though they aim for sustainability in all business operations, their greatest impact comes from the things that make up their value proposition. Circularity is the core of the company. Every time the company succeeds in a business sense, there is a positive impact for the planet as well.
Secondly, Everywhere Apparel shows that it is possible to sustainably operate in the fashion and textile space. With diligence, creativity, and clear values, a brand can build a positive impact. Everywhere has had to chart its own course, steering clear of newly made fibers, microplastics, and other concerns. Even with the supply chain complexities that accompany fashion in the 21st century, Everywhere has been able to offer companies corporate swag that makes a positive impact.