Gift Focus - Nov/Dec 2019 (Issue 116)

106 Be kind, always Gift Focus tal s to friends Lucie Carr and Charlie Williams about The Kindness Co-op, their lifestyle company that has the purpose of promoting kindness towards others, ourselves and the environment and donates a percentage of its profits to charity How did you meet and how did you come up with the plan to start The Kindness Co-op? Lucie had already set up her own online business in 2014 selling independent brands kid’s clothes, toys and décor in Brighton, so when I talked about doing the same thing, a mutual friend put us in touch with each other so Lucie could impart her wisdom! As it happened we had an immediate connection and it soon became obvious that we would make a great team – one a natural entrepreneur, full of ideas and enthusiasm and the other with a retail background and experience. Tell us a bit about The Kindness Co-op and the charity you work with. The initial idea behind The Kindness Co-op was to create a brand that encouraged more selflessness and positivity, particularly between children. We wanted to spread clear-cut messages – Be Kind To Each Other, Be Kind To Our Planet and so on. It’s a simple mission but one that becomes more relevant every day. We chose YoungMinds as our charity of choice as Lucie felt that, if a charity such as YoungMinds (championing children and adolescent’s mental health) had existed when she was growing up, her younger years may have been very different. With regards to ‘being kind to our planet’, we source certified organic fabrics, get our screen-printing done locally using eco- friendly inks, print our flyers and tags on recycled paper, wrap our products in tissue paper and use fully recyclable Kraft paper envelopes with recycled paper cushioning. Our products also have no plastic packaging. Nobody’s perfect but it’s definitely getting easier to source more eco-friendly items, so we’re always on the lookout for new ways of improving our eco-credentials. What challenges did you overcome as a new company? For us, we believe we have a strong product, which is ethically made and great quality, but getting it ‘out there’ has been a huge hurdle. It’s always hard starting a small business and having to be the merchandiser, buyer, web developer, PR, logistics, sales team, and designer etc. However, we’ve finally realised that PR is just beyond our capabilities, so we have brought in a consultant to help us out. Has the current economic climate affected yourself as a start-up? It’s certainly made for a very challenging market, which is constantly shifting, especially with the surge to combat climate change. However, we want customers to buy mindfully, knowing that if they buy a garment from us it can get handed down, worn and re-worn. We’re aiming for longevity here. What products and gift lines do you offer? We stock t-shirts and sweatshirts for adults and kids, but we also do button badges, notebooks, enamel pins, bags and will soon be doing iron on patches. We’re also developing a fancy dress kit around our kindness theme. Are you planning on expanding into other product areas? We would like to be using garments made from recycled fabrics so are looking at ways of doing this. We’d also love to find the right factory to work with so we could get an all over print design made. Currently we’re limited to placement print garments, as they’re all hand screen printed locally in Hove. It would be great to offer jersey items with an all over design. Who is your target market? We’re looking for socially conscious consumers who value quality and design and want to shop more mindfully. Currently all our garments are unisex but we know our customers are predominantly female, so we may add some more fitted styles to the range in the future. What’s your proudest achievement to date? We were super excited when we launched in the Bai360 gift shop. Up until that point all the stock had been in boxes and then to suddenly see it on display was awesome. Where do you see yourself in five years? We’ve set goals and even stretch goals but essentially the plan is to get stocked in several independents, plus maybe even somewhere like John Lewis if it comes knocking, who knows! We’re not looking to be millionaires; this was never about that. It was about creating something meaningful whilst raising our families. Even if the business folds tomorrow we feel so lucky to have learnt so many new skills and so much about ourselves over the last five years, as well as cementing an amazing friendship. It’s also been humbling to be part of such an awesome wider community of like-minded entrepreneurs. We’ve been shown such kindness and would like to pass it on. For more information, call +44 (0)7958 720 165 , email hello@thekindnessco-op.com or visit thekindnessco-op.com