A muted and retrained start to 2022 for most, but we hope you found some sparkle in the mist! ✨

We’ve been taking some time in these first fresh days of the new year to consider what we want the year to be filled with, and what we want to be different by December. The first full year of HERD was utterly, mind-blowingly amazing with recognition from press, influencers and industry-insiders, and an array of wonderful new customers on our journey alongside us. Thank you, thank you each and all.

We are a fashion industry first, a vertically integrated farm to fibre enterprise which rewards each and every stakeholder along the supply chain, reconnecting people, brands and farmers with how knitwear is made.

Our business model of producing knitwear, knitting yarn for other brands and hand-knit balls, with projects in development to use the by-products in products like duvet and felting, means low waste, low impact and low emissions.

Our pioneering innovations in scaling up plant dyes mean we are exemplifying industry best practice, and changing attitudes in the industry about plant dyes being unstable or dull.

Our elevated yarn, designs and stitches display the exceptional skills of the craftspeople of N.W England.

BUT

We do have challenges. The wool industry in the U.K. has been decimated by synthetic fibres and imports, and must be rebuilt from the ground up.

Farming has also been neglected and compromised and yet we need to draw more of our food, packaging and clothing from the soil than from oil than ever before.

SO

Here are our Pledges for the year ahead:

1/ Provide full traceability from soil to skin

2/ Cut no corners on quality and performance 

3/ Pursue circularity at all costs

4/ Champion heritage skills 

5/ Disrupt harmful supply chains, prove best practice

6/ Connect the dots

We will be exploring these in more depth as the year progresses in these mail-outs and our IG Lives every Thursday at 3pm.

Wishing you a joy-filled, fresh-faced January.

Ru x