Assignment:
Unfortunately in this century, most consumers are wasteful. On an annual average, the world releases about 1.3 billion tons of wastage. This is a trend that is worrying because there is no outlet for a good percentage of this waste. If at all this practice is not addressed, then we risk losing the world as we know it to mountains and mountains of waste. Due to this alarming hazardous practice, most industries and manufactures have adopted waste minimization techniques that reduce wastage therefore significant resource savings and cost reduction.
This is a Swedish denim company that is known for production of jeans wear. It is one of the companies that have a large customer base because almost everyone wears jeans. Their product, jeans, does not easily decompose therefore once it is worn out, consumers throw it out and with time, piles and piles of jeans can be seen in the waste pits.
Just like all other jeans companies, Nudie Jeans had no way of ensuring that their products didn't end up as part of the waste in the environment. The company's initial means of operation was one where it delivered the product to the customer and after that it was not in any way responsible for what would happen to the clothes. After a while, the company came to the realization that their way of operation was making the environment worse.
Implementation of sustainable methods
At some point, the company came up with a genius idea that involved being a part of its products even after they were in the custody of the consumer. The company set up a 1,400 square foot shop at the corner of Spring Street in Manhattan, a place where people go to get their denim jeans repaired. Instead of people throwing out their torn and worn out denim, they are advised to take them to this joint for repair (Kaur, 2016).
This augured well with most of its customers since they had a chance of still holding on to their jeans for a while longer. Since the inception of this idea, the wastage that the company incurred has greatly reduced. Their products have a longer lifespan through remaining useful to the consumer for a longer period of time.
Other than repairing the jeans themselves, the company has provided services where it teaches the consumers on how they can repair their own jeans. For all consumers that are not in a position to access the repair point in Manhattan, there are online videos by Nudie Jeans that teach them how to repair and re- use jeans.
To add on to watching online videos on how to repair jeans, the company also provides mail order repair kits for jeans (Kaur, 2016). If a customer wants to repair their jeans, they can order repair kits from Nudie. This has shown good results because the company can make money from selling the kits and still increase the ‘life span' of its products.
If at all the customer doesn't want the jeans at all, the company has provided an avenue for the consumer to return the worn out jeans. Nudie then repurposes and resells the jeans. This strategy helps in reducing the cost of production through recycling of goods.
Rationale for how this company still made profits
As mentioned earlier on, one of the wastage reduction methods implemented by Nudie requires consumers to return some of the jeans that they are no longer using for the purpose of recycling. This gives the company profits because it will definitely spend less money on production of the raw material used to make jeans (Fuchs & Dyllick, 2016)
The repair service that Nudie jeans adopted helped attract a good customer base. More and more people chose to buy their jeans from Nudie because they would for sure get repair services. More customers led to more profits
Evaluate other businesses that might benefit from the waste reduction measures of this company.
Fashion industries could greatly benefit from this methodology. Brands like Prada, Channel and Louis Vuitton could turn around their businesses if they adopted this methodology because they will be at a position of reducing wastage and establishing a good customer base.
References
Kaur, J. (2016). Designing of one piece dresses from used jeans (Doctoral dissertation, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana).
Fuchs, L., & Dyllick, T. (2016). Circular Economy Approaches for the Apparel Industry (Doctoral dissertation, Universität St. Gallen).
Kaye-Smith, H. W. (2017). Doing laundry more sustainably: Disrupting everyday practices through media conversations(Doctoral dissertation, Western Sydney University (Australia)).