Fibershed: A Case Study In Sourcing Textiles Locally

 I applaud the effort and absolutely love the concept but one look at the prices on Fibershed's online market explains why our clothes are manufactured overseas using synthetic products. Locally homegrown, natural clothing may have a market, but one that only the wealthy can afford. While such clothing will probably never compete in price with the crap manufactured overseas, ultimately these efforts must produce a product that is affordable to the average consumer if domestically, self-sustaning clothing products are ever to become a selection on our store shelves. Otherwise, the products, wonderful though they may be, will forever be only clothing for the well-heeled and a curiosity for the rest of us.

I love the idea, and I am well within your 150 mile range, so I checked out the marketplace fully ready to buy some things. Holy... $223 for a scarf and $1,112 for a jacket? Sustainable to manufacture maybe, but not too sustainable for the average person's pocketbook. 

I'd be curious to know if this is just what the process costs or do you see the prices coming down?  I love the idea, but when the people that are supporting the movement can't afford to buy the products, you have a catch-22. Best of luck.

ewes come and get the fiber. you can shear 'em for free. , the wool is worth less than the effort. now in the SHTF time i imagine we'll learn mighty quick.  robie

Consider that the median personal income for an American worker over age 25 with a full-time job grosses  (before tax) $19.23 per hour (at 2,080 hours per year, just shy of $40,000).

Or consider even a person making minimum wage grosses (before tax) $7.25 per hour (at 2,080 hours per year, about $15,000).

Think of how much labor and time it takes to...

Prepare ground, plant and water seedings for indigo or coreopsis plants, weed and hoe, harvest and process... Care for sheep, watering, doctoring, feeding, sheltering, shepherding, shearing... Carding, and turning into yarn and dying the yarn and drying it... Finally knitting the scarf or jacket by hand. In the United States.

I can easily see why a hand-made scarf might cost over $200, or a jacket made of choice alpaca fiber might cost close to $100.

The clothes you and i wear today take advantage of machinery and labor arbitrage. The minimum wage for a skilled agricultural worker or a power loom factory worker in India might be around $80 to $200 per month. Check the label on the clothes you wear. Even if it were made in the USA, the fabric came from somewhere else.

In the end, this is about deciding what you want to do with your money, and where you want that money going.

Hey, some people go to India for hip replacements done by Western-trained doctors, too. It costs about a third to half the going rate in the U.S. - and it includes air fare and hotel for both patient and a travel companion, even a personal nurse assigned to be with you 24/7 while in recovery.

Poet

...of such an effort as "Fibershed" is not trying to provide sustainably-produced garments at a price competitive to the stuff made in China, Thailand, Mexico, Pakistan et alia, but rather to put into place a localized sustainable garment-producing infrastructure -- and to provide Proof of Concept that such can be done.

Certainly, in the near term at these prices the only customers will be the well-to-do.  But suppose all those long, just-in-time supply chains become disrupted.  When this fever-dream "economy" has the wheels fall off (i.e. when the printing ceases to have an effect and the whole edifice comes crashing down), labor and goods will be re-priced in a way that reflects their actual value.  (Yes, Virginia, there is a Price Discovery Claus!) 

Having in place a workable (and replicable) model for the production of clothing locally and sustainably will be invaluable.  All those kids who've just graduated with (now worthless) degrees in communications can instead go to "Fibershed University", learn the skills, and then (with some seed money) start up their own Fibersheds in an underserved locale.  We're always going to need clothes.  Those who can provide them will do well.  

Over on the "Interview Dr. Chris" thread, somebody asked about skills/careers that they might pursue that could be relevant/reliable 10-20 years from now.  Sit up and take notice.

One man's opinion...

Viva -- Sager

To continue Sager's argument, consider how we'll be able to clothe ourselves in a world where the cheap imports aren't available:

1. We'll much smaller wardrobes and we'll wear our clothes until they're truly worn out (too worn to be functional rather than today's standard of too worn to be fashionable).  We'll also patch and repair the clothing several times along the way to wearing it out.
2. We'll sew and knit the clothing ourselves, patch and repair it ourselves and even spin the yarn and weave the fabric ourselves.
3. We'll even grow the fiber and dye plants ourselves and raise the animals that produce the wool.
4. If we pay someone to do any of the steps for us, their labor won't be so expensive because the won't have the expectations of buying so many consumer goods with their earnings.

I spent a couple of years reading the Little House on the Prairie series with my kids at bedtime. It's amazing (to those of us living today) how little clothing they owned and how much effort they put into creating and maintaining it.  They generally owned one fine outfit that was worn only on special occasions to be sure it lasted a long, long time.

 My grandmother told me that her father had sheep in the Tennessee hills until the taste of the public changed from mutton to beef----that may have coincided with refrigeration and other technologies.  They were not just grown for their wool.  At any rate, people did not create clothing for sale, but for family members. A clothing gift was truly appreciated.

I have a friend here who nobly fought to keep the cotton mills open.  They stayed open until they were near bankrupcy because they could not compete.  

I love to sew.  i enjoy the feel of the fabric in my hands.  I like making something different that is not in the stores.  Since there is little in the fabric stores, I have learned to shop on the internet, where fabrics have been brought back to the U.S. and designers have simply bought too much.  So I suppose I  am sorting through the crumbs.

Would I sew for profit in today's economy?  Of course not.  If I actually charged a living wage, my products would be priced too high for almost anyone--even using imported fabrics.  That is the place for true designers who have made it their careers.  The factories have found ways to buy in large quantities, cut construction time, reduce labor costs, and sell efficiently. 

I have been teaching myself  a new survival skill--how to cut from measurements instead of professional patterns.  It is a stretch to teach yourself, and I am a bit timid, but I am learning.  

I am not so impressed by the garments on the Fibershed website--are they spinning their own threads and sewing by hand?  Perhaps they are not using interfacings?  I would think that most anyone could knit or crochet a scarf if they could get the yarn.

Let me give you an idea of how expensive and time-consuming handmade clothes once were.

Wills of the middle class in the 1600s before the Industrial Revolution would often state that pillows and bedding, clothing - SPECIFIC clothing like a jacket or a suit - would be granted to an heir.

Poet

The bolded bits in the quotes above bring to mind this quote from "Fight Club":

Not that I share that exact vision of the future, but Poet & Steve brought it to my mind.  Just sayin.  

Then there's this:

Brings to mind my farm grandmother talking about putting on our "Sunday best".  Which for my farm grandpa included a Homburg...  Serious grampa steelo!    But when my brother & I were quite young -- before my father's ascent up the corporate career ladder -- one nice little kid suit (plus Tam o'Shanters) was all we had.

Just groovin' on the subject matter on a cold, snowy New England night.

Viva -- Sager

Regarding the purpose and your statement: "The garments were primarily hand-constructed"  Why on earth are you throwing out or ignoring all of the technology that has been developed and accumulated over these years?  Perhaps you are  pandering to the 1% with hand-made boutique items that they can show off to their rich friends?  This makes no sense to me.  At the very least you can employ or develop some solar powered  electric  machinery.   I do not agree with reversion to the stone age as a response to the upcoming reset.  Appropriate technology can take us forward.  Real creativity would take into account existing and possible technology maximally to use as tools for low cost low labor textile making.  I dont see anything new here and I dont worship the old lifestyle of low tech life that my great grandparents had and prayed for relief from.