Rethinking Fikay Eco Fashion's distribution model helped founder Aaron Jones stay true to the firm's ecological principles
Aaron Jones at Fikay Eco Fashion found a way to cut costs and help the environment by transporting his recycled-packaging bags, wallets and cases from Cambodia to Britain by bus and boat, rather than by plane. The logistics rethink requires a bit more forward planning – the journey takes up to 40 days, rather than two – but it cuts carbon emissions and saves an estimated £22,000 a year in transport costs.
Jones, a 22-year-old final-year student of international enterprise and business development at the University of Essex, started Fikay in 2011 after a gap year in Asia. He spotted bags made from cement sacks and old fish-feed packets – featuring striking tiger, elephant, eagle and cobra designs – for sale at a market in Cambodia, and started researching the supply chain.
After months sourcing and selling test items to friends and family in the UK, Jones decided he had a viable business idea and ploughed in funds from his student overdraft, family and friends.
Fikay works with a Cambodian organisation that provides microloans to local women to buy sewing machines. The company pays them "fair wages" to make bags, satchels and wallets: in a country where the minimum wage is $80 a month, Fikay's workers earn an average of $150 to $250.
"We pay a fair, competitive wage to local villagers who create our bags out of locally sourced, recycled materials," says Jones. "This gives them the opportunity to learn valuable skills that permit them to have a sustainable, effective way out of poverty."
For every sale, Fikay makes a contribution to a school in Siem Reap, in north-west Cambodia – where eight of the workers are based – providing stationery and helping with school fees. Jones's dream is to build schools in the areas where his workers are based.
When Fikay launched, Jones flew stock from Vietnam to the UK. It was quick and easy, but expensive and damaging to the environment, he says. Now, he transports the products by bus from Cambodia to Vietnam, which has better freight-shipping facilities. Then around 80% of his goods make a 30-40 day journey by boat to Tilbury docks, in Essex, with the remaining 20% travelling by air.
"Transporting by boat is trickier to plan," says Jones. "But since 90% of the business is wholesale at the moment, it's OK. If I get an order for 600 to 1,000 units wholesale, then, typically, that has a lead-in time of two months."
As well as being better for the environment, the cost savings are huge, with transport by boat costing as little as $2 (£1.25) a kilogramme, compared with about $9 by air.
Fikay has started selling wholesale to retailers in Russia, Italy and Greece, and is launching a crowdfunding project to sell its first recycled-packaging guitar cases. Jones is also working with an NGO to expand into Rwanda and Uganda.
"When I started Fikay, I knew I wanted to try to make money – but not at any cost," says Jones. "We have made a strategic decision from day one to take ethical responsibility for every part of our supply chain and we want our logistic arrangements to build communities as well as making commercial sense."
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