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Students Market Clothing with Conscience
B-schoolers from Miami University of Ohio team with socially-conscious fashion brand Edun for a lesson in helping Africa through commerce
by Kerry Miller
A new pilot program at Miami University of Ohio is combining two big trends in the world of business education—social entrepreneurship and experiential learning—and adding one very big name to that mix: Bono.
The initiative, dubbed Edun Live on Campus, is a business partnership between a group of Miami University students and Edun, the clothing company co-founded last year by activist Ali Hewson, Bono's wife, and designer Rogan Gregory—along with a little help from Hewson's rock star husband.
As a "socially conscious" clothing company, Edun says its mission is "trade, not aid"—creating sustainable employment in the developing world, and Sub-Saharan Africa in particular. Its primary fashion line sells in upmarket department stores and specialty shops such as Saks Fifth Avenue (SKS) and Anthropologie. A sub-brand, Edun Live, was created as a higher-volume business-to-business arm selling blank T-shirts that are "100% African," from the organic cotton they're made with to the manufacturing. Bono's band, U2, uses Edun Live blanks for their concert tees.
School Spirit
The Miami University students buy the blank shirts from Edun Live for about $4 per shirt, have them screen-printed with custom designs, and sell them to student groups and local businesses for about $10 each—a few dollars more than similar T-shirts sourced locally would cost. The group's profits, which average $1 per shirt, go to fund social entrepreneurship activities at the school, including a proposed student trip to visit Edun's factory in Africa.
A Miami alumnus provided the initial $50,000 of seed capital to get the project up and running, and Edun executives are serving on Edun Live's board of directors. So far the students have sold about 2,000 shirts, and they hope to roll out their business model to campuses across the country later this year.
In doing so, they're getting a living lesson in social entrepreneurship and innovative solutions to social problems, rather than just creating profits. Enthusiasm for the approach has been growing for some time at the MBA level, though it's still just catching on among undergraduate B-schoolers.
Expanding the Field
Over the past three years or so, undergraduate courses, centers, and clubs devoted to social entrepreneurship have been popping up at schools like University of California at Berkeley, Duke, and Stanford. Last fall, New York University launched the Catherine B. Reynolds Foundation Program in Social Entrepreneurship, an interdisciplinary program for junior and senior undergraduate students, and Wake Forest University is now offering a new interdisciplinary minor in Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise.
At Miami University, things got off the ground last fall when Assistant Professor Brett Smith helped launch a new Center for Social Entrepreneurship within the Farmer School of Business, devoted to furthering teaching, research, and outreach related to the topic. He also created and taught the school's first undergraduate course on social entrepreneurship, which by next year Smith hopes to expand to a three-course sequence
Edun chief executive Christian Kemp-Griffin says the company had already been looking for a way to penetrate the college market when he got an e-mail in the middle of last year from Smith, who is now the project's faculty adviser. For Edun, Kemp-Griffin says the partnership is an ideal exercise in brand-, consumer-, and volume-building. "It's getting people involved in the issues by being a part of a business, and I think that's a really motivating way for people to do it—it's not hearsay, it's not marketing push, it's actually happening."
Not Where But How
Of course, using students to spread awareness of social justice issues is not without precedent. The antisweatshop movement that began in the late 1990s was fueled largely by activists on college campuses. Since then, companies like T-shirt maker American Apparel have taken the idea of conscious consumption (or "ethical fashion") decidedly more mainstream (see BusinessWeek.com, 9/27/06, "Green Threads for the Eco Chic").
In fact, Kemp-Griffin admits that in terms of their approach, Edun Live and American Apparel—which makes its own clothing in Los Angeles—aren't that different. He says both are selling a philosophy, "trade in Africa" or "sweatshop-free, made-in the USA," as much as a T-shirt. "It's just that the reason to buy is different," he says.
And is that enough to keep college kids interested? For Edun's part, Kemp-Griffin says that while he hasn't seen the details of the Miami group's business plan yet, the company is committed to taking an active in role in helping them succeed," so it isn't just, 'okay, my fraternity bought a T-shirt, we've done our bit.'" He says it'll be up to both parties to figure out new ways to promote the business and attract and retain customers, "…anything that a normal business would need to do to stay alive and grow and prosper."
Filling a Need
Smith, for one, is optimistic, citing preliminary market research conducted by his students that 92% of Miami undergrads buy at least four screen-printed T-shirts per year, and 72% of them said they would pay more for a T-shirt that supports a cause. "As long as college students need T-shirts, we will continue to have a sustainable business," Smith says.
And in the short-term, he adds, the project has already done a lot to build awareness at the university. "Everyone stereotypes Miami students as living in a bubble and not caring, and I think we've proven that stereotype wrong," says senior Andy Mitchelides, president of Edun Live on Campus. "I think we've given hope to people that you can make a difference, even if it's on a small scale."
Click here for a slide show of fashion brands that are marketing themselves as "socially conscious."
B-schoolers from Miami University of Ohio team with socially-conscious fashion brand Edun for a lesson in helping Africa through commerce
by Kerry Miller
A new pilot program at Miami University of Ohio is combining two big trends in the world of business education—social entrepreneurship and experiential learning—and adding one very big name to that mix: Bono.
The initiative, dubbed Edun Live on Campus, is a business partnership between a group of Miami University students and Edun, the clothing company co-founded last year by activist Ali Hewson, Bono's wife, and designer Rogan Gregory—along with a little help from Hewson's rock star husband.
As a "socially conscious" clothing company, Edun says its mission is "trade, not aid"—creating sustainable employment in the developing world, and Sub-Saharan Africa in particular. Its primary fashion line sells in upmarket department stores and specialty shops such as Saks Fifth Avenue (SKS) and Anthropologie. A sub-brand, Edun Live, was created as a higher-volume business-to-business arm selling blank T-shirts that are "100% African," from the organic cotton they're made with to the manufacturing. Bono's band, U2, uses Edun Live blanks for their concert tees.
School Spirit
The Miami University students buy the blank shirts from Edun Live for about $4 per shirt, have them screen-printed with custom designs, and sell them to student groups and local businesses for about $10 each—a few dollars more than similar T-shirts sourced locally would cost. The group's profits, which average $1 per shirt, go to fund social entrepreneurship activities at the school, including a proposed student trip to visit Edun's factory in Africa.
A Miami alumnus provided the initial $50,000 of seed capital to get the project up and running, and Edun executives are serving on Edun Live's board of directors. So far the students have sold about 2,000 shirts, and they hope to roll out their business model to campuses across the country later this year.
In doing so, they're getting a living lesson in social entrepreneurship and innovative solutions to social problems, rather than just creating profits. Enthusiasm for the approach has been growing for some time at the MBA level, though it's still just catching on among undergraduate B-schoolers.
Expanding the Field
Over the past three years or so, undergraduate courses, centers, and clubs devoted to social entrepreneurship have been popping up at schools like University of California at Berkeley, Duke, and Stanford. Last fall, New York University launched the Catherine B. Reynolds Foundation Program in Social Entrepreneurship, an interdisciplinary program for junior and senior undergraduate students, and Wake Forest University is now offering a new interdisciplinary minor in Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise.
At Miami University, things got off the ground last fall when Assistant Professor Brett Smith helped launch a new Center for Social Entrepreneurship within the Farmer School of Business, devoted to furthering teaching, research, and outreach related to the topic. He also created and taught the school's first undergraduate course on social entrepreneurship, which by next year Smith hopes to expand to a three-course sequence
Edun chief executive Christian Kemp-Griffin says the company had already been looking for a way to penetrate the college market when he got an e-mail in the middle of last year from Smith, who is now the project's faculty adviser. For Edun, Kemp-Griffin says the partnership is an ideal exercise in brand-, consumer-, and volume-building. "It's getting people involved in the issues by being a part of a business, and I think that's a really motivating way for people to do it—it's not hearsay, it's not marketing push, it's actually happening."
Not Where But How
Of course, using students to spread awareness of social justice issues is not without precedent. The antisweatshop movement that began in the late 1990s was fueled largely by activists on college campuses. Since then, companies like T-shirt maker American Apparel have taken the idea of conscious consumption (or "ethical fashion") decidedly more mainstream (see BusinessWeek.com, 9/27/06, "Green Threads for the Eco Chic").
In fact, Kemp-Griffin admits that in terms of their approach, Edun Live and American Apparel—which makes its own clothing in Los Angeles—aren't that different. He says both are selling a philosophy, "trade in Africa" or "sweatshop-free, made-in the USA," as much as a T-shirt. "It's just that the reason to buy is different," he says.
And is that enough to keep college kids interested? For Edun's part, Kemp-Griffin says that while he hasn't seen the details of the Miami group's business plan yet, the company is committed to taking an active in role in helping them succeed," so it isn't just, 'okay, my fraternity bought a T-shirt, we've done our bit.'" He says it'll be up to both parties to figure out new ways to promote the business and attract and retain customers, "…anything that a normal business would need to do to stay alive and grow and prosper."
Filling a Need
Smith, for one, is optimistic, citing preliminary market research conducted by his students that 92% of Miami undergrads buy at least four screen-printed T-shirts per year, and 72% of them said they would pay more for a T-shirt that supports a cause. "As long as college students need T-shirts, we will continue to have a sustainable business," Smith says.
And in the short-term, he adds, the project has already done a lot to build awareness at the university. "Everyone stereotypes Miami students as living in a bubble and not caring, and I think we've proven that stereotype wrong," says senior Andy Mitchelides, president of Edun Live on Campus. "I think we've given hope to people that you can make a difference, even if it's on a small scale."
Click here for a slide show of fashion brands that are marketing themselves as "socially conscious."
that would be so cool if i could convince my society on poverty to sell edun tshirts this semester.
