Icebreaker Blog - Holy Sheep!

Holy Sheep! is our weblog of latest news, product releases,
and events related to Icebreaker employees, friends and customers. Enjoy!

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You are currently browsing the archives for the Sustainability category.

Planting Trees for the Future

Over the past few years, for everyone that signs up to our email database, we plant a tree for them through Trees for the Future.

Trees for the Future work with people to improve livelihoods and restore degraded lands to sustainable productivity through planting beneficial trees.

We think it’s a great venture and in the past year we’ve planted 22,603 trees for you all.  We want to plant even more in the next year, so please tell your friends about our email sign up programme - not only will they get to be the first to find out all about our latest news and special offers, but they can make a difference and help communities around the world.

- Brooke Riley, Icebreaker Global Web Project Manager

tff-logo

Run, But Leave No Footprint Behind

We love this! As seen on NBC5 in Chicago.

How can you run a marathon the green way? Fleet Feet Sports shows you how. And when you upgrade your gear, you can even recycle your old sneakers with them.

I Can See Your Underpants

We want people to see our undies! And our v-necks and crewes.

Our friends at TinyChoices.com blog about trying out our garments and using Baacode to trace it through our supply chain and back to the Glen Orkney and Stonehenge sheep stations.

Jenn at Tiny Choices writes: “I am happy to own a piece of clothing which I kind of consider an investment: the high price ensures that each purchase is carefully considered, and the material - wool - is sure to last a very long time.”

We’ve had over 80,000 people view Baacode since we started our traceability programme last November.

We’ve just added new sheep stations and soon you will be able to trace Icebreaker socks too. Sustainablility has always been core to us, and we think it starts with transparency and traceability.

We’ve also heard of a few companies in other industries with tracebility programmes:

Stone-Buhr flour in Washington State in the U.S. has a “Find the Farmer” program The New York Times reported on.

An apparel group in The Netherlands has a track & trace program, which starts at the factory/manufacturing level -not at the origin of the ingredients (flour, fibre, rubber, etc.).

An Aussie company allows you to trace your jam, and was featured by Springwise

And here’s an effort involving jewellery.

Traceability is also becoming a major issue in the fair labour world. The Fair Labour Association is partnering with several organizations cotton traceability.

Do you know of other efforts?

We’re still learning and experimenting with Baacode and hope you’re enjoying meeting our Southern Alps farmers and sheep.

What do you think so far?

Reusing, Recycling, & Refashioning Icebreaker

Viktor and Viola from the Czech Republic are big fans of Icebreaker…so when a new addition to their family came along, they decided to get creative with baby clothing.

Viola´s old Icebreaker Tech-T wasn’t buried in the garden to break down, or re-made into a shopping bag - instead she refashioned it into baby Vinc’s luxury bodywear.

Vinc thinks his new Icebreaker is great - it’s soft, breathable and odour resistant (a very important feature at this age!).

Vinc is our Czech man of the month!

Hiking for Earth Day

Although every day is effectively Earth Day, the flock from our US office and Icebreaker Touch_Lab store in Portland went for a lunchtime hike in Forest Park to celebrate Earth Day 2009.

We are keen on reducing our carbon footprint, so everyone (including two four-legged friends) piled into Pdx PediCabs and headed to the park where we met Stephen Hatfield, from the Forest Park Conservancy (FPC).

The FPC is all about protecting the precious piece of earth known as Forest Park, and with Icebreaker merino garments being renewable, sustainable, biodegradable and gentle on the environment, it was a great fit.  We enjoyed a fabulous hike up to the historic Stone House in Forest Park, taking in the beautiful surroundings.

- Molly King, Marketing Coordinator

To show continued support for the FPC, 10% of all Earth Day sales from the Icebreaker Touch_Lab_ store were donated to the Forest Park Conservancy Fund.