Competition - Win £100 worth of Spreadshirt DIY clothes
Hippy Shopper has teamed up with Spreadshirt.co.uk for the launch of their new certified organic cotton range, and we’re giving away £300 worth of vouchers to spend on your own DIY (Design It Yourself) clothes. (To enter the competition click “continue reading…” below.)
Now after all of that excitement, what can I say about this Spreadshirt malarkey? I have three words: bloomin’ brilliant idea. You upload any design or slogan you want, use their design feature to plonk it on a t-shirt, hoody etc. and receive your garment apparently within 48 hours. Spreadshirt now carries five new items made from certified organic cotton. Continental Clothing "Organics" and American Apparel "Sustainables" come in four colours, plus they’ve even got an organic cotton babygrow as requested by eco-conscious parents.
Related stories: Sandbag organic T-shirts | The perfect T-shirt
Spreadshirt are making big eco and ethical efforts, including donating three euros for every garment sold by the 16th May to Earth Day International, an annual event aimed at raising environmental awareness worldwide. Some might claim that Spreadshirt commitments are a response to some bad press they received recently in which it was claimed they supplied unethical garments to Hazel Blears. She suspended sales of T-shirts promoting her campaign for the Labour Party deputy leadership over fears they may be linked to a factory disaster in Bangladesh.
But I would like to give Spreadshirt some positive press in this area. Firstly because Spreadshirt was only mentioned in a supply chain and had no direct involvement. Secondly, the two suppliers of their new organic range appear to be ethically squeaky clean. American Apparel has a no sweatshop policy, producing everything in their Los Angeles factory and paying almost double California's minimum wage. But the best reason for an ethical consumer to look fondly on Spreadshirt is their overwhelmingly good response to any ethical questions. They have their own blog and forum, on which they post an immediate response to any questions levelled at them by concerned customers.
We live in a world where companies increasingly have to be fair to fare well in the public eye, and a company that responds positively, like Spreadshirt, should be given encouragement. On the whole, it depends greatly on whether we buy their organic T-shirts and keep asking those important questions that will make all the difference.
Competition: We’re giving £100 worth of e-vouchers to spend on the Spreadshirt website to 3 lucky Hippy Shopper readers. All you have to do is send an e-mail with “Spreadshirt” for a subject to hippycomps@gmail.com and we’ll pick the winners at random.
