Students can opt for better apparel

Last week we talked about the Designated Suppliers Program. The reality of the situation is that there is another policy option that both sides have ignored.

Change these days seems to be coming from the bottom up not the top down.

A tiny company in Brooklyn is revolutionizing the apparel industry. They are doing to T-shirts what fair trade did to coffee and chocolate.

In the words of Bill Gates" ""we need a more creative capitalism."" Joe Falcone" the founder of Counter Sourcing seems to have done just that.

The firm plows 10 percent of its profits into a living wage fund 6 percent towards improving workers rights and 1 percent towards environmental protection. Yes that's $2.37 for every $14 you spend on a Counter Sourced T-shirt at Student Stores. And because the firm currently works with one factory in Bangladesh you can rest assured that every penny is going to workers that need it.

In fact Mr. Falcone has partnered up with a local NGO in Bangladesh called Phulki to fund projects in the local community that factory workers select. And this isn't a fly by the night group. Their executive director is an Ashoka Fellow — a social entrepreneurship program. Talk about local people taking ownership of their future.

Wouldn't SAW love to know that the first supplier to ink an order was UNC? Yes our University who they claim is dragging its feet had the honor of taking the lead on this issue in fall of 2006.

Wouldn't you the consumer love to know that these T-shirts are competitively priced? Student Stores issues the same markup on these T-shirts as it does for all others.

Chances are you probably never bothered to look at the T-shirt tag before buying. That's because Student Stores never bothered to advertise the fair-trade apparel it was selling. They figured we didn't care.

Now you have every reason to care.

If you think about it Counter Sourcing is a market-driven DSP. The company pays above market wages and empowers workers two of the DSP's underlying goals. It's a solution that doesn't require the administration signing anything.

This debate doesn't have to be about SAW versus the administration. It should be about ways we as consumers can creatively impact supply chains so that workers at the bottom live better off. That's a common goal we all share.

You can take that first step by silently voting with your pocketbook. That's how Nike caved into pressure during the 1990s and that's how the apparel market will change.

It'll show the administration that demand for these products exists. In turn they'll order more fair trade apparel a la DSP and we'll have a wider selection to choose from.

If we demand clothing from manufacturers that pay above market wages and reinvest their earnings in local communities then the market will deliver.

In this case it has. And we just didn't know about it.

Excuses no more. Now you know.

The next time you are at Student Stores ask for Counter Sourcing apparel (hint — their tag logo is a circle of rings). They have it. You just gotta ask for it.