buy better, buy less = save planet earth
Our pursuit to make
better clothes.
This is the story about our belief that everyone
can pitch in, even if just a little. And we can all create
a better home planet!
The Reality Check: Trouble in Paradise
It was the perfect place for our honeymoon: One of the tiny dreamscape islands in an exotic country with fabulous, picturesque beaches, powder-white sand and crystal clear turquoise water. PARADISE ON EARTH! After a romantic stroll to the inland of the island, beyond the calm and idyllic tourist bungalows, Magdalena discovered the backside of heaven: A landfill where all the trash generated on the island ended up: Plastic bottles, beer cans, nylon fishing nets in heaps and more heaps. Tourism, globalization and a too rapid, non-sustainable growth of this place had caused extremely negative side effects. After reading up to see what happened to trash in places like that this was our wake up call to figure out what we could do to raise awareness and help people become more sustainable: Because everyone can make a change even if they don’t realize it.
The Quality Focus = No to fast fashion!
Having a big passion around design and fashion we decided to create the very first really sustainable and organic children’s clothing brand for the Polish market. After investing our savings: around 2000 EUR, we created the first batch of colorful and unique clothes made from the highest quality organic and certified cotton. From the very first minute, our focus was to create durable, long-lasting clothes that could be handed over to the next kid, and the next kid after that. The clothes instantly became a success, and we had our first international wholesale orders just after a month! We decided to give it a go, maybe we could bring the concept of better quality = lesser consumption = less waste to the international public! These are the very beginnings of Raspberry Republic…
Okay...So what can I do to feel less guilty about this mess?
We are Magdalena and Piotr Stepinski, the founders and sole owners of Raspberry Republic. We live in Poland, in a small, tidy and picturesque Warsaw-suburb where the grass is green, hedges are cut straight and trash is picked up on time and recycled. Together we have three children: Laura, Gabriel and Astrid and we do tons of fun as a family!
This idyllic life seems far away from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, toxic landfills and environmental catastrophes of other places on Earth: A planet that is slowly dying because of stupid decisions made by us humans.
People like us, people like you and me can have a hard time figuring out what they can do to help: we watch horrible videos in the news of garbage in the Ocean but don’t know what we can do from the comfort of our cozy homes. And we feel bad that we can’t do anything or that we aren’t doing enough…
The truth is that we can start by taking small steps: we can ride our bicycle to work instead of taking the car, use less single-use plastic containers, eat less meat and more vegetables…And consume less products: A whopping 32 billion garments are produced each year, and that is for the U.S market alone! 64% of these garments later end up in a landfill*.
One way to contribute is to buy less garments and focus on items of high quality, that will last longer, be more durable to wear and wash and that can be sold or handed over as pre-loved. At Raspberry Republic we focus on organic or sustainable materials of the highest quality and on the organic processes (such as steaming, pre-washing, mechanical stretching) to give these materials a longer life. We are also proud to say that our production is fully ethical and based here in Poland.
If you are interested in reading more about our quality and why we think a Raspberry Republic garment is a great investment please visit our quality section.
* Source: ThredUp
