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It can be a daunting task to design, print, distribute and sell a range of t-shirts -- add in the difficulty of sourcing ethical materials and it gets even worse. But if you go online, with printing company Zazzle you can not only set up an online store to sell your own designs or fave Flickr photos, but also print them on ethical and organic cotton t-shirts from edun LIVE, part of eco-fashion label Edun launched by Bono and his wife, Ali Hewson.
edun LIVE's
blank t-shirts are printed on cotton sourced directly from African growers as part of their 'grower to sewer' goal of ensuring every step of the t-shirt supply chain takes place in sub-Saharan Africa. They say this will create jobs and long-term sustainable employment as well as transferring skills, improving trade on the ground and building a solid base for the clothing industry.
When it comes to actually designing your t-shirt, Zazzle thankfully takes care of everything -- all you have to do is upload your designs. Customers can then purchase t-shirts, mugs, posters and all manner of things with your chosen image or pattern. Zazzle estimates that there are 3,440,918,457 different products on sale -- so if you're shopping rather than designing you're bound to find something pretty unique.
Zazzle could be making more effort to be green; their packaging and ink still aren't as environmentally friendly as they could be, but the edun LIVE t-shirts are a good green bonus -- and because the cotton is 'combed' (meaning it has gone through a non-chemical cleaning process that makes it extremely soft) they probably feel pretty good, too.
A small percentage of each t-shirt sale will also be donated to edun LIVE, to recruit more growers and increase the number of t-shirts made.
14 December 2007 11:55am
Thanks for this, really interesting. We struggles to fine eco-friendly t-shirt printes, spreadshirt.net do some but not a great range.
07 July 2008 04:17am
What is not environmentally friendly about their packaging and ink? What type of ink do they use? What type would you rather they use?
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