COVER STORY
accreditation and an Ethical Clothing Australia accreditation . What we want to set ourselves up to be is not just the best Blak brand , but one of the best streetwear brands on the market .
We also employ 37 people . Of this team , over 90 per cent are Indigenous and most staff are under the age of 25 . In FY22 , we created just under 28,000 hours of Aboriginal youth employment . I ’ m really proud that we ’ re able to hold a space for young Aboriginal people , and have worked to create cultural safety by increasing the number of Blak people in this space .
I ’ m also proud of our employment growth and the way we deliberately choose to do business to create jobs . We ’ ve chosen to keep picking , packing and distribution in-house , because we know that ’ s where we are able to create the majority of our employment .
YWH : Are there things you think the non-Indigenous fashion sector and other businesses can learn from First Nations businesses ? LT : There ’ s so much . I just came back from the Retail Fest conference on the Gold Coast . So many people asked me about our ROI or our email open rate . We ’ re not motivated by those types of
Our byline is uniting people through fashion and a cause .
numbers . What we are motivated by is our values and the conversations we are elevating and driving every day , with the aim of creating better outcomes for Mob in this country . What was interesting is when we did look at those e-commerce indicators , we were not only on par with many major retailers but exceeding their benchmarks . When you lead with values in business , supporters ( or customers ) see this , connect and come on that journey with you .
We were recently awarded for being in the top five per cent of B corps internationally , in the Community category of the ‘ Best for the World ’ awards . First Nations businesses often inherently hold people , Country , community and the wider good at the core of their work , rather than trying to retrofit a business model to an impact piece . There ’ s loads that non-Indigenous businesses can learn from the way we , and many other Blak businesses , work .
YWH : There are different motivators . LT : We ’ re motivated by community and integrity . I want to make my community proud . I care about what Aboriginal people think about our brand . We focus on keeping community at the heart of what we do , and it ’ s integral to everything we do . Our engagement is huge because we ’ ve been able to engage not just the Blak community , but broader Australia , too . They ’ re not just following us for our clothes , but for the education , stories and people that we ’ re able to share and elevate across our platform . I ’ ve learned that so many Blak businesses are driven by the same thing – how we can do better for our Mob . Not so much around those other measures of success . If you start with the values , it can also be viable .
YWH : Are there key barriers or challenges in terms of connecting a broader customer base to First Nations products and items ? I was talking to people from another Aboriginal brand who said they had to spend something like $ 3,000 on a labelling system just to qualify to stock somewhere . LT : It ’ s difficult because everyone ’ s on such a different journey . We invested in labelling and barcode-reading gear early on , just to be able to meet growing demand . We learnt from walking across the road in Brunswick to Sheet Society . We said , ‘ You guys are selling a lot of sheets during Covid-19 . What warehouse system do you use ?’
They were honestly incredible and opened their doors to us to explain their systems – essentially we just replicated that . What Sheet Society did for us was share some practical information about what was working for them . We continue to pass this on to Blak businesses and social enterprises . Handon-heart , when other businesses come in , I ’ ll say , ‘ These are the systems we use , and this is how we found them .’ That insight is so valuable when people are living and breathing and experiencing the same thing . There ’ s no need to hide this knowledge when it can help someone else .
If we were able to be more coordinated , there would be more opportunities for us to support one another . As Blak brands , we ’ re all dealing with similar challenges . For example , we could get better rates and scale of economy if we all went to the same supplier , ordered the same blank tees and so on . I would like to get to the point where we started to come together in that way .
YWH : What else do you think mainstream retailers could be doing to be good allies ? ►
30 | www . insideretail . com . au May 2023