Designing for an organic cotton future

If organic production is to expand, textile and clothing companies need to stimulate the demand. Manufacturers in California took this step in the early 1990s, and many other companies are now following suit.  Lynda Grose was involved at the outset and writes about the part designers can play in this process.

Introduction
Whenever a new idea or need challenges the status quo, there is inevitably conflict. We can observe this in many areas: business and environment, cost and environmental goals, design aesthetics and environmental considerations, for example.
    Traditionally, we are trained to think that both sides must compromise to resolve conflict. However it is often the determination not to compromise principles that forces innovation. In order to establish an innovative idea over the long-term, one must build bridges to integrate the new thinking into the old. In this way we can prevent inspired solutions from becoming a mere niche and create change.
    Designers have an important role to play in this process. Trained as creative problem-solvers and, by their very nature, always striving to do things better, they can often identify opportunities where the conventional business mind may see problems. In order to realise their vision in a business environment, they become adept at building bridges on their own terms. By incorporating environmental impact considerations into this established commercial design process, they can make a valuable contribution to the advancement of organic cotton in the mainstream market.

Potential conflicts
The present industrial system
Traditionally, farmers and even the textile mills are separated from the marketplace.  Apparel manufacturers, comprising design, merchandising, trend analysis and retail sales, observe the marketplace and plan their business according to anticipated retail customer buying patterns.  For example, Easter and Christmas are particularly high volume sales periods.  The yearly business plan usually includes a delivery of new merchandise every month.   Designers plan the size and look of the line according to the business plan, design fabrics for fashion trends, visual variety and a range of price points, and specify fabric developments through textile mills. Designers are generally unaware of the environmental issues and costs faced by farmers and mills and these issues are not part of their daily design considerations.  Costs to develop the raw fibre into a finished garment are calculated and marked-up accordingly at each step of the process. It is a linear system (see diagram).
    Clothing designers are the link between the manufacturing process and the customer, between the technical and the end marketing requirements.

Problems: real or perceived?
The organic cotton movement continues to go through ups and downs as a fledgling industry. The three  most common concerns are the extra cost of growing the fibre and of special processing through the mills, the lack of variety and fashion appeal of organic fabrics and an unaware, uneducated public.
    These issues are often presented as the reasons why the organic cotton industry may always in future be limited to niche markets.  However, designers manage a whole host of limits during the development of a product.  The only obstacle to solving these additional problems is our inability or reluctance to widen our vision to encompass them in our standard creative process.

Long-term solution or quick-fix?
A popular 'solution' to these perceptual problems has been labelling conventionally produced unbleached cotton 'environmentally friendly' and presenting a 'natural' or 'green' message to the customer. Many manufacturers used this approach and enjoyed market success. But it has serious limitations. It meets business target costs, but compromises environmental goals. It does not help to create a demand for organic cotton, or influence farmers to plant more organic acreage and so lead to a reduction in chemical use on the farm. It does not educate the customer about the real environmental impact of conventional cotton production, and it does not force any innovative ways of working that will help shift the industrial system as a whole.
    As designers, our focus is too often on styling, competition in the marketplace and price. This is the design equivalent of industry cleaning polluted environments, rather than preventing pollution in the first place. By focusing on the end of the product life cycle, and working backwards to minimise environmental impact, we run into the inertia of the industrial system. By educating ourselves about the environmental impact of textiles throughout their life cycle and by becoming involved in the whole process, we can put our creativity to work earlier in the system and create change more broadly and more effectively.

Costs and environmental goals
Farmers

• In the United States, costs of organic cotton production on the farm are currently 15-20% higher than conventional, though some organic farmers are producing greater yields with less seed planted.

• Farmers depend on credit using the crop as collateral, and financing organisations can influence production decisions to minimise their risk of not being repaid. Consequently, they favour the predictable yields of chemical intensive farming methods over organic farming, and may even deny financing to organic farmers.

• Growing cotton organically has initial risks for the farmer. Reduced yields can mean lower returns on investments in the crop. The incentive of a higher premium for organic cotton cannot be realised until a transition period of three years has been fulfilled (although this regulation has recently been reviewed at the international level). Only then can the fibre be labelled 'organic' and command a higher price.

Mills

• The main costs for mills in processing organic fibre are incurred in cleaning the spinning machinery between running conventional and organic cotton. Whole spinning lines are shut down, air-blown and reset to prevent the organic fibre from being contaminated with pesticide residues from the previous conventional fibre run.

• Until recently only knitting mills were involved with organic cotton. The construction of a knitted fabric is much less complex than a woven fabric and the minimum quantities are smaller. For a fledgling industry organic cotton T-shirts and knits have been an obvious first step. However with product variety limited to knitted products, cost becomes a major concern. Who needs a more expensive T-shirt? Justification of higher prices is indeed a challenge to communicate to the customer.

Aesthetics and environmental goals

• Clothing represents 70% of the conventional cotton market and is the main focus of organic cotton development. Unfortunately, the cornerstone of the clothing industry is short-term trend. Organic cotton has enjoyed much publicity as part of the early 1990's interest in eco-fashion, but as trends have changed, so have many of the businesses and markets for organic cotton fibre.

• Different size yarns are needed for different fabrics and each yarn type is spun on a separate run. A T-shirt may require a 1/20 yarn, for example, and jeans a 1/10 yarn. A minimum quantity of yarn is needed to make each spinning run cost-efficient. If these minimum quantities are not met, the costs increase proportionately. Consolidating yarn-types to increase quantities and improve efficiency, limits variety for both designer and customer.

•  In the conventional cotton industry, fibre from several different countries is usually blended together before spinning to achieve consistent quality over large quantities. With limited international organic growing, consistent quality can be a problem in the final fabric. Combined with the saturation of organic knits in the eco-clothing market, organic cotton clothing has gained a reputation for being unsophisticated, boring and poor quality.

Designers build bridges and create real solutions
In the US, the Organic Cotton Conferences, founded by the California Institute for Rural Studies have helped to bring manufacturers, mills and farmers together to discuss the real issues about the organic cotton industry from farm to marketplace. Through these conferences and continued dialogue, solutions are being found which will build an conomically and ecologically sustainable industry. Design and research departments have often spearheaded many of the following solutions, and worked to influence business managers within an organisation.

Building bridges with farmers
The main issues here are the environmental and health effects of pesticide use, the difficulty in making the transition from conventional to organic, the costs of organic production and the difficulty in obtaining financing.

Transitional organic cotton
Aware of the environmental and health benefits and interested in marketing the latest 'hot organic item' to an increasingly concerned public, many manufacturers entered the organic cotton market in Spring 1990. Through the conferences, farmers' difficulties in making the transition from conventional growing became apparent. By Autumn 1992, many manufacturers had purchased transitional organic cotton, as well as certified organic, in order to support the farmers in making the change. Grown organically, and registered in a bona fide certification programme, transitional organic cotton did not compromise environmental goals and it helped a great deal to reach business goals. Commanding less of a premium than organic, transitional fibre brought the final cost of the garments down. More farmers were encouraged to make the shift, and with increased supply, costs were again reduced.

Pre-harvest contracts
Learning of the difficulties organic farmers had in obtaining financing, and anticipating that the market interest would generate increased demand for a fibre in short supply, the clothing manufacturers Esprit made a pre-harvest commitment to an agreed quantity of organic cotton. This move had several advantages. It provided up-front financing for the farmers, guaranteed a market for the organic crop, and secured a reduced price for Esprit as much as 15% below post-harvest spot-market cotton prices. This marked a radical departure from the normal way of working in the textile industry. Clothing business managers, working with designers, had to anticipate their retail cotton business and fabric types an additional year in advance, and purchase the appropriate qualities of cotton according to a natural cycle (a once-a-year-harvest), as opposed to an industrial cycle (twelve retail deliveries a year).

Building bridges with mills
The main issues here are the production limitations and minimum quantities, costs and the lack of variety.

Product variety
As more mills have become involved in the organic cotton industry, competition has increased and prices  have tended to decrease. More importantly, and partly due to the requests from designers, a greater variety of fabrics has been possible. This has enabled manufacturers to provide a range of products and price points at the retail level, and a perceived greater value to the customer. Different product categories command a different retail price-elasticity.  In other words the customer is reluctant to pay even 5% more for an organic cotton T-shirt, but for a well-designed jacket or sweater may pay as much as 200% more.

Consolidated quantities
As product selection has improved, more parties have become interested in the industry and consolidated mill quantities have increased. By now, some mills are able to maintain a completely separate run of organic cotton, thereby eliminating their costly shutdown and cleaning procedures. Some major manufacturers have discussed potential for bilateral consolidation of yarn orders with a mill.  Although not yet acted upon, this would mark a radically different way to do business in an increasingly competitive industry.

Improved quality
As experience is gained and the movement spreads internationally, source variety will increase and diversity of blends will be possible, leading to greater consistency in the quality performance of the yarn and fabric.

Design issues
The main issues here are cost,  limited fabric variety from mills and restricted creativity.
    The designer is in a key position to recognise environmental aspects of processing, integrate industry possibilities and restrictions, and at the same time build value into the product. Many of the aforementioned solutions have been initiated by designers and research teams bringing the ecological vision into the business process. The aesthetic permutations are endless, but the following example illustrates one of the many possible scenarios.
    A designer could be faced with the problem of limited fabric variety from the mills.  A cotton fabric begins as raw fibre which is 'combed' to remove vegetable matter and to align the fibre before spinning.  At this stage, the fibre can be dyed and the different colour fibres blended together, or other fibres such as wool or linen may be mixed with the cotton to create additional texture and natural colour variations.  Any one of these options in fibre form represents a single 'article' for the mill which may, in turn, be spun into a variety of yarn sizes and twists to create more potential variety later on in the fabric development process. After spinning, yarns may be left 'simple' or 'plied' with other yarns of different sizes, content or colour to create an infinite variety of end products.  Weaving these novelty and basic yarns in different combinations creates greater value in the eyes of the customer and commands a higher retail price. 
    So, by becoming informed about the mill's restrictions, and  accepting the technical and commercial restraints, designers can create a multitude of choices which they would perhaps not explore if the restrictions did not exist.  In this way, we can approach environmental constraints as opportunities to expand, rather than stifle our creativity.  Moreover, the end of the creative development process-stying and communication of the environmental benefits-becomes part of a complex web of choices made throughout the life cycle of the product, rather than the  main determinant for its success or failure in the retail market. In addition, this way of working creates opportunities to add visual value at several points during the  product development process.

Conclusion
Organic cotton is now at a point where it is being applied company-wide, replacing conventional cotton products at Patagonia, for example.
    Since the cotton industry has brought organic products into the mainstream market, the same principles are now being applied to the wool and linen industries. This will broaden the organic movement and increase future opportunities for variety.
    By acknowledging the potential conflict between environmental objectives, business objectives and creative objectives, and by building bridges from each side without compromising basic principles, innovative solutions can be continuously discovered. We simply need to apply ourselves to the task of creative problem-solving. This is the true essence of design.

Lynda Grose founded the Esprit Ecollection concept.  She is now based in San Francisco and is an independent consultant in ecological product development.

[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 28, June 1995, pages 9-11]