the district

About Us

The idea behind District Cotton is simple; making clothing better.  We are out to show the world that looking good doesn’t have to come at a cost greater than what’s on the price-tag.  District Cotton aims to offer a line of clothes that are as fashionable as they are functional, without all of the excess-baggage so often associated with the apparel industry.   To us, corporate responsibility is not about trying to green-wash what we are already doing, but rather it’s about building a company from the ground up which places labor and environmental concerns at the core of its being. While we certainly don’t claim to be a panacea for all that ails the apparel industry, we are run by people like you that will always make decisions based on more than just the bottom line.

With a desire to continually question and evaluate our business practices, we want to keep making District a better company by making our clothes in a better way.  This is our first draft of a constant work in progress, we hope you like it.  

Environmental Sustainability

Conventional cotton, like any other crop today, is grown using large amounts of chemical fertilizers and pesticides with sever environmental consequences.  Cotton in particular is one of the most chemically intensive crops to grow commercially, requiring nearly 1/3 of a pound of pesticides to produce enough material for one t-shirt.  Globally that adds up to 25% of the world's insecticides and more than 10% of the pesticides used in commercial farming.  Organic cotton, however, is grown without the use of these contaminants which is better for the farmers, better for the environment, and better for you.  The quality and feel of our cotton t-shirts and sweatshirts is second to none, making the choice to go organic an easy one.

Social Responsibility

The apparel industry has long-since been plagued with a reputation of paying poor wages while tolerating less than ideal working conditions.  Over the last several decades the standard practice for apparel production in the U.S. has become a business model in which “manufacturers” don’t ever own a single sewing machine, instead buying their goods from contracted factories around the globe.  Commonly known as the “race to the bottom” this model allows companies to relocate their production to the cheapest destination at a moment’s notice.  The ease of relocating operations across international borders has forced most of the developing world into a fiercely competitive battle to attract their share of the limited amount of apparel manufacturing jobs available.  In other words, figuring that bad jobs are better than no jobs, developing countries have been forced to keep their wages low and labor compliance poor in order to remain globally competitive.  

At District Cotton we realize that the real price of chasing penny-per-garment savings around the globe is not worth the human cost (as do many other clothing companies both big and small).  The alternative to this “Wal-Mart model” of continually grinding down suppliers’ prices through the threat of abandoning them is to create genuine partnerships. Ultimately yielding greater long-term benefits for all parties involved, we believe that choosing factories should be about more than just the cost of the garment this season.