Voices
the brand, no matter how diligently it may scrutinize its supply
chain, the global nature of largescale manufacturing entails so
many hands touching products in
so many different places, no system can keep tabs on all of them.
And that, combined with the
pressures incumbent on factories
to produce clothes at the lowest
possible prices, ensures that some
of this production will wind up
taking place in the underground
market — beyond the purview of
local regulators, and outside the
realm of the lawyered-up codes of
conduct that supposedly govern
modern commerce.
There was ample evidence for
this reality long ago. But in the
wake of the deadliest garment
industry disaster in history — the
collapse of a factory complex in
Bangladesh, which took the lives
of more than 900 people — this
truth is more evident than ever.
This truth explains how Benetton — a prominent brand that has
marketed itself as an archetype
of global style — now finds itself
cast as the latest poster child of
the sweatshop conditions that put
clothes in our closets.
First, the company said none of
its products had been made inside
PETER S.
GOODMAN
HUFFINGTON
05.19.13
the doomed Bangladesh factory.
Then, after photographs taken at
the scene of the disaster revealed
Benetton products strewn in the
rubble, the company said that, yes,
it had once placed an order. Then,
in an exclusive interview with my
colleague Kim Bhasin last week,
Benetton’s chief executive officer
confirmed that the company had
indeed purchased about 200,000
cotton shirts from a supplier in-
Bangladesh is poor,
and poverty is dangerous.
But these tragedies
are systemic.”
side the factory, though it was a
relationship of short duration.
The confusion, Benetton executives explained, came from the fact
that the order had initially been
placed with another supplier in
India. When the Indian firm struggled to fulfill the order, it shifted
some of the work to another factory — the plant in Bangladesh.
Benetton presumably had to
move quickly to keep the product
moving. That meant taking a leap
of faith that shifting to another factory — a company Benetton has ac-