How Ethical Merch Co is providing its customers with ethically sourced promo goods
Ethical Merch Co is a manufacturer and reseller of promo goods and branded apparel, based in Australia. They can add their clients’ logos to just about anything – from bibles to bandaids.
Why Ethical Merch Co joined Sedex
As Ethical Merch Co began to grow, it gained several large non-profit customers. While price was important to their customers, Ethical Merch Co recognised that brand reputation was most important of all.
Nathan Kingston, Managing Director of Ethical Merch Co, heard about Sedex from a friend who is a consultant in supply chains. They recommended that Ethical Merch Co rise to meet the challenge of providing their clients with ethically sourced products.
Nathan quickly recognised that Sedex had a reputation for strong business ethics, and wanted to partner with a likeminded company. Through collaboration and partnership, Sedex helped Ethical Merch Co to educate themselves and others in their supply chain about responsible business. Being a Sedex member, through association, has helped them open dialogues about responsible sourcing with customers.
How Ethical Merch Co has helped its customers meet the challenge of responsible sourcing
Ethical Merch Co assesses as far down their supply chain as possible to provide assurance to their own customers. They use Sedex SAQ data, SMETA audit data and a bespoke questionnaire, supplemented by telephone interviews, to map and explore their supply chain. Ethical Merch Co has mapped their first tier of supply chain, but for some products they have mapped further tiers – for example a T-shirt that could be mapped to six tiers from raw material harvesting through to production. By doing so, Ethical Merch Co is able to educate both their customers and their suppliers about the value of responsible business.
Ethical Merch Co knows that their customers are looking at SAQ and SMETA audit data too, so Ethical Merch Co is using these tools to create an opportunity to demonstrate to their customers that they can provide their customers with ethically sourced promo goods.
What else is Ethical Merch Co doing to improve responsible business practices?
Ethical Merch Co has produced an Ethical Sourcing Roadmap, a business plan and code of conduct to address their growth ambitions in the most sustainable way.
Although Australia’s Modern Slavery Act is only applicable to companies with revenue over $100m (AUD), Ethical Merch Co voluntarily produced and submitted a Modern Slavery Statement. Ethical Merch Co submitted this in the hope of making a difference in the market place by sharing best practice examples from their own business. They feel ethical trade can be adopted relatively easily with simple changes to day-to-day operations, bringing benefits not just to their own business, but also their customers and suppliers.
