We are based in Sweden and would love to produce inhouse. But the reality is different. Sweden's factories and production technology knowledge was outsourced decades ago and although we take steps to bring it back, it is still a long way until we can produce raw materials and products close to us. We produce in China. Here are 3 reasons why:
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Compared to Europe, China is way ahead when it comes to production technology and modern machinery
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The raw material and the fabrics we use are made in China
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We have retailers in Asia
We sourced our suppliers ourselves. It was a passionate and time consuming process that involved a lot of traveling, beautiful meetings and visits to more than 20 factories, to check working and sanitary conditions for the workers and the production itself.
Today we work with 5 suppliers, based in neighbouring areas, close to the harbour from where we ship. One of them provides only packaging materials and hangtags.
Every time we visit, we stay until the task is done, to minimize the shipping of prototypes back and forth to Sweden. This allows us to get a closer insight to the work and build a better relationship to our suppliers on a personal level. Furthermore, as part of our social and environmental responsibility, all of our associated factories have external third party enforced compliance controls and checks on an annual basis. We ensure that the people who manufacture our products are treated with respect and have safe and secure working conditions, and we are carbon compensating all our production.
These third party-audits are made by BSCI (Business Social Compliance Initiative), SMETA (SEDEX Members Ethical Trade Audit) and Climate Neutral.