On wednesday 18 September 2013 Blake Lapthorn's Climate Change team hosted a green breakfast seminar titled Eco-fashion for the green consumer, with guest speaker Mart Drake-Knight of Rapanui.
4. “It’s not that people don’t care about
sustainability
It’s just that they don’t know.”
Core principles of 21st
century life?
• Education - Communicate
• Economy - Worth
• Aspiration - Want
5. • Change buyer behaviour? Cost / Time / Convenience
• Itchy brown socks?!
NO
6. • Sustainable supply chains – important.
• Who pays? Change must be funded by demand
• How to Fuel Demand?
I’m Mart and my background is in engineering wind turbines and this is my brother Rob, And my background is in business We’re the founders of Rapanui a business that is Game changing the way that fashion works and improving the quality of life of unemployed young people on the isle of Wight
Our business makes clothing, That look just like what we’re wearing, made from sustainable materials made using renewable energy, in ethically-accredited factories. Rapanui is a B2C fashion brand, and our products are accessably priced, from £15-25 for a t-shirt – you can buy them in your shop, on your phone or online. Most importantly though, our designs are bang on trend and as a result , we have more orders than we can fulfill
Our products are made from sustainable materials, but it’s the way that we sell them that turns heads. We believe that ‘it’s not people don’t care about it, it’s just that they don’t know . As well as the design of our products we have developed some unique innovations; The one we want to draw attention to now is our ecolabel Here’s a graph that shows the popularity of our designs. Some good some bad. A normal business would buy more popular ones and get rid of the less popular ones. Environmentalism, social impact – sustainability is an afterthought. At Rapanui, we developed this nifty little A-G ecolabel rating – adapted it from lightbulbs - and this is the really exciting bit: Check how the popularity changes. Now we restock the most sustainable items, and cant get rid of the D rated stuff. That’s not subsidised, pushing of sustainability – that’s market forces demanding Rapanui. We think we have the key to unlock the demand for sustainability that’s in everyone, even 18 to 25 year olds! We’ve got some other exciting innovations we can show you perhaps later, like how you can take your phone and scan one of our swing tags to see exactly where our clothing comes from, how it was made and who made it – from seed to shop. Our business model is simple: the same jack wills Growth journey, except because of the sustainable and social design of our business the outcome is totally different. We’re making sustainability itself look cool.
Why have we decided to start this business? We’re from the Isle of Wight We were in this graph, and we know there’s a lot of other people like us in there too. We realised that we could Use business to solve a problem and make some money. We’ve built a business around these values, which includes helping nurture local talent. Since then we’ve delivered local social impact linked to our growth Build a business around our values, which is to help nurture local talent. Since then we’ve delivered local social impact linked to our growth Incubation – businesses tailored Work experience programmes with opportunities – access to apprentceships and jobs Working in partnership with leading UK training provider to get young people into work.
Our business makes clothing, That look just like what we’re wearing, made from sustainable materials made using renewable energy, in ethically-accredited factories. Rapanui is a B2C fashion brand, and our products are accessably priced, from £15-25 for a t-shirt – you can buy them in your shop, on your phone or online. Most importantly though, our designs are bang on trend and as a result , we have more orders than we can fulfill
How we make our money now. Why is Sir David Attenborough saying this?
Why have we decided to start this business? We’re from the Isle of Wight We were in this graph, and we know there’s a lot of other people like us in there too. We realised that we could Use business to solve a problem and make some money. We’ve built a business around these values, which includes helping nurture local talent. Since then we’ve delivered local social impact linked to our growth Build a business around our values, which is to help nurture local talent. Since then we’ve delivered local social impact linked to our growth Incubation – businesses tailored Work experience programmes with opportunities – access to apprentceships and jobs Working in partnership with leading UK training provider to get young people into work.
Social impact, quickly. tailored Work experience programmes with opportunities – access to apprentceships - Working in partnership with leading UK training provider to get young people into work programmes like apprenticeships. Also Business incubation. The investment in talent. All 8 full time employees were long-term unemployed and we invest in them to train them into high-tech, or managerial roles – whether it’s SEO, Admin or Retail management. Toilet cleaner to FD story. So what do we get out of all this? We actually think it’s a genuinely good strategy with our Super loyal dynamic, inspired and energetic team payback! This shines through in everything from customer service to product development
Here’s Sir David Attenborough saying we’re a most interesting and valuable project but how does the business make money? Well that quote is a good example of how. Now we do our current business through E-commerce, stockists, shops - even some bespoke, making t-shirts for red bull o2. Most of you might be thinking, fashion is all well an good but it requires huge amounts of investment in marketing and promotion. Key difference, key strength, is that most brands need huge marketing investment. What if we told you that we’d started the business with £200 each and we’ve gone from shed to shop by spending zero pounds, zero pennies on advertising. strength of brand gives us a massive advantage in fashion industry. We’ve eve See strength - Unlocked demand, need WC to turn all potential into reality.
We’re Looking to talk to people who want to be a part of the first brand to make sustainability mainstream, and be part of a business that takes the next jack wills journey but we’re not just going to make a load of money, we’re actually change the world with it.