Finally my Manchester Sneaker by Macbeth has arrived! I bought it from www.veganessentials.com website, they sell alot of vegan products, for those of you who are planning to go cruelty free lifestyle I highly recommend you take a look at their website, plenty of products and the shipping charges is reasonable. But I have to tell you, their response to emails is not usually fast, so please have patience with them. For international buyers, get a shipping quotation first before you place order as they do combine shipping so you can save money!
OK, back to the Macbeth shoes, I am so excited when I first open the box and there it is, a vegan sweatshop free sneaker. My first impression, the sneaker is solid made and you can feel the quality is good. I put it on without socks and it feels a little bit stiff comparing to the Vans ( Rowley III ) which has more cushioning feel. I put it on and wear it for an hour or so, walked around with it and it gradually feel nicer with socks.
Now, I'm just curious about this sneaker is actually made from China! Mmm..I thought it was made in the USA or any sweatshop free country but no, it is from China! The main reason I ordered online is because I tried not to support anything from sweatshop. I will email veganessentials and find out more about this, hopefully I will get some happy answers from them.
Anyways, overall I am happy with the Macbeth sneaker and the most important thing it is vegan!
4 comments:
OH yeah, you better get an answer from them!!! China is FAMOUS for sweatshops.
made in china still 100% original, so dont worry ;)
Hi, did you get an answer from veganessentials? Sweatshop free?
What are your policies on labor for the products you carry?
People often ask about our policy on fair-labor for the goods we sell, and we're more than happy to share details on anything you would like to know regarding the manufacturers we work with. The products we sell other than wearable items are almost always from small businesses inside the USA or Europe, so unfair labor isn't an issue with their production. For wearables, here is our current status:
The shoes that we carry come from a variety of companies who have production in quite a few different countries - we don't actually produce any of the items we sell, but rather we try to offer the largest selection of all-vegan goods from over a hundred manufacturers in one place.
These products are made in the following countries:
UK
Spain
USA
Italy
Australia
Romania
Brazil
Portugal
Colombia (cooperatively made footwear)
China
We're very concerned with sweatshop production - we don't like to offer anything that's exploitative to the people making the products as we feel it's very important to be human-friendly as well as animal-friendly. We have a thorough screening for all shoe and accessory companies that we carry products from regarding the production they use, and we ask them to verify the following situations regarding their production:
1. No child labor
2. No forced labor
3. Fair pay relative to the respective country
4. No hazardous working conditions/facility up to code
5. No excessive hours for employees
If a footwear company is not willing to attest to these factors for their production we will not work with them. Even after this, we do our own independent research through various websites to look for any contradictions - if we find anything that may show the company is not being honest about their labor standards we will refuse to carry their products. This is very important to us, and we have maintained this standard since our company formed. For Chinese manufacturing we pay especially close attention to these factors since sweatshop production is so prevalent in much of that nation. However, there are a handful of companies working to make a difference in China by raising the standards of a quality work environment, and these are the kind of companies we seek out.
Some of the shirts we carry are all fair-labor made in the USA (such as all the Herbivore Clothing designs, the "Please Don't Eat the Animals shirt, the "Why Not?" shirt and the "Vegan Compassion" design), though some of the others in specific styles change on the shirts they're made on from batch to batch and we never know what we're going to receive. A few of the companies whose products we carry seem to work with whatever shirts they can get on demand (most likely from smaller print runs), and this is why many of them change from batch to batch. We're hoping that in time these companies will convert solely to using USA-made shirts for their production. We wish that there were more choices for vegan and animal-rights themed shirts that were made solely on fair-labor certified shirts, but there are so few companies out there that choices are limited and difficult to come by. Oddly enough, it has been far easier for us to work with fair-labor footwear manufacturers than it has for shirts! If you'd like to let us know what shirts you're particularly interested in we'll let you know the status of where they're made for what we currently have in stock so you'll know if there's anything you would wish to wear.
For hemp goods, these are all made in a fair-trade facility in Romania or are made in the USA - Ecolution and Splaff have always been at the forefront of fair-labor production, and those companies make all the hemp goods we carry.
For belts, almost all are made in fair-labor facilities in the UK, while the remaining few exceptions are all made in the USA.
For men's or unisex wallets, these are either the hemp wallets made in Romania or they are the VeganWares wallets that are handmade in Australia.
Again, if we can assist with any questions on a product, please feel free to write or call and we'll always be happy to help in any way possible.
What is your contact information?
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