AHEAD announces that its pre-book sales of the new eco-friendly performance line, featuring Cocona natural technology, is well ahead of forecast.
FEATURE
What exactly is 'Eco-Friendly?'
By Janice Ferguson
GPA Correspondent
While there is no legal definition of eco-friendly, Webster's New Millennium Dictionary of English defines eco-friendly as an adjective meaning not harmful to the environment.
Wikipedia takes the definition further by saying environmental friendly, eco-friendly and nature friendly are synonyms used to refer to goods and services considered to inflict minimal harm on the environment.
To make consumers aware, environmentally friendly goods and services are often marked with eco-labels. But because there is no single international standard for this concept, the International Organization for Standardization considers such labels too vague to be meaningful.
In the United States, the phrase is commonly used for advertising or on packaging to promote a sale, but no federal standard is required to display the labels, so the United States Environmental Protection Agency deems them useless in determining whether a product is truly "green."
Surprised?
With all of the strides being made to reduce carbon footprints and save our earth from becoming over-polluted, regulations of what can or cannot be considered eco-friendly are surely in the works. But in the meantime, we're on our own to become more eco-savvy.
Which green or eco-friendly claims are really and truly not 100 percent harmful to the environment? We could say the Apparel Wire e-publication is green because we're not using traditional newsprint -although newsprint can be re-used in the garden as a mulch to control weeds - or slick magazine paper full of chemical dyes. We communicate with you via miles and miles of cable buried in the ground and end up on your computer screen.
Electronic media certainly seems better for the earth than traditional forms, but it's not completely green - it is vague - and the same can be said for the green claims made by golf apparel manufacturers.
Products are greener than before and the attempts should be applauded. Eco-friendly is a direction many companies want to go because they are genuinely concerned about the environment. And while most efforts seem sincere, there are also those who view this as the latest fad to market products. Dedication and a commitment to continue and improve green efforts will define a company's true ability to walk the talk.
The golf apparel industry is basically divided into two camps - natural fibers and man-made synthetic use of materials. Cotton is a natural fiber and mostly known for a comfort factor in clothing. But the use of insecticides during the growing process makes it a target for not being as green as we'd like to think. Did you know producing enough cotton for one t-shirt requires 257 gallons of water?
Synthetics have the reputation of providing better technical qualities in clothing. But man-made products use a lot of energy, and materials such as polyester are petroleum-based making them detrimental to the environment on many levels.
Recycled synthetics or plastics, as with anything recycled, are a step in the right direction. But if a more eco-friendly fabric was used in the first place - well, there goes the hamster round and round the wheel again.
The use of toxic chemical dyes - those that make all the fabulous color choices in our clothing, only exacerbates the issue. Wrap your brain around this fact: 700,000 tons of synthetic dyestuffs are applied to 40 million tons of fabric a year.
More sustainable resources like bamboo, organic cotton and hemp are the most eco-friendly fabrics because they are biodegradable, they don't require pesticides or chemicals, and they use less water, thus making them more efficient for farmers to grow. But if they are grown in other countries, what does it take to transport them to market - energy. Often they are more expensive as a result.
The same energy-use argument can be made for clothing manufactured overseas, as well as possible poor labor conditions - another criteria used to determine eco-friendly status - or use of factories that emit pollution.
Natural technologies such as cocona, where coconut shells from food industry waste are heated and the activated carbon from the process is infused into fibers then blended with cotton, polyester or nylon to add performance based properties, give a longer lifespan to a garment. One more stride in the right eco-direction but, last time, not completely green.
The tangled web of eco-friendly fabrics is about as complicated as, well, a web. As consumers, we don't have much control over a product's manufacturing processes, except to decide what to buy and what not to buy. As a golf apparel publication, we would never suggest showing up at the golf course in a burlap sack, but if you want to be more ethical about your fashion consider the following:
• More than 500,000 tons of unwanted clothes end up in landfills each year. It is estimated that 95 percent could be recycled. This one is easy - donate your used clothing, don't ever throw them in the trash.
• Wardrobe consultants tell us if you haven't worn something in a year, get it out of your closet. The flip side is to be more conscientious when you make an apparel purchase - buy timeless, not always trendy. Then make sure you wear it at least once a year.
• Two-thirds of a garment's carbon footprint will occur after it is purchased. A University of Cambridge Institute for Manufacturing study found that 60 percent of the energy use associated with a piece of clothing comes from cleaning it. Air-drying, at least in the warmer months, is the cheapest and most eco-friendly way to dry clothes, and will prolong their wearability.
• Consider switching to environmentally-friendly detergents, washing clothes in cold water, (which can save you $65 a year and cut your washer's energy use by 75 percent), and skipping the fabric softener sheets are greener options for garment care.
• Take time to read clothing labels. Educate yourself and understand the fabric content, treatment terminology and their possible side effects to the environment using a quick Google search. Then make an informed buying decision based on your level of concern for the earth.
For tips on greening up your wardrobe, visit planetgreen.discovery.com and click on fashion and beauty.
