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Finally, something good comes from the comments section.
On March 26, D2C shoe brand Rothy’s asked its 312,000 Instagram followers how it could better assist COVID-19 relief efforts. Within hours, over 500 ideas poured in. All the collaboration in the comments led Rothy’s to come up with the Open Innovation Coalition.
The Coalition is an initiative to collect and open source manufacturing know-how so retailers can produce personal protective equipment (PPE) for medical workers. I spoke with members of the Rothy’s team to get a look behind the Coalition’s seams.
A-team, assemble
The Open Innovation Coalition is a corporate group project, but Rothy’s isn’t the valedictorian doing all of the work alone.
The muscle: “We have a pretty broad set of different retail partners, from beauty care to a company that their core business is producing disposable gloves,” Saskia Van Gendt, Rothy's head of sustainability, tells me. Fifteen brands have joined the Coalition so far, including Lucky Brand, Marine Layer, and ThirdLove.
The mindshare: In addition to devoting about 30% of its manufacturing time to making masks, Rothy’s is coordinating other brands’ entry to the program. With Rothy’s acting as Collaboration Czar, participating companies...
- Contribute to a collection of raw materials that can be used to make PPE
- Exchange patterns and templates to produce in-demand medical gear
- Pool manufacturing capabilities to speed up PPE production
- Distribute completed PPE to hospitals and frontline workers in need
What’s this look like in practice? ThirdLove connected its elastic supplier with Lucky Brand to provide straps for masks, for example.
The end goal: The Open Innovation Coalition hopes to give PPE to at least 1 million people in the U.S. over the next three months.
Looking ahead...collaborations like the Coalition may not end with the pandemic, but they could take a different form. Van Gent tells me finding materials for PPE could eventually turn into sourcing sustainable materials to reduce waste throughout the retail supply chain.
My CTA: If your company wants to join the Coalition, email [email protected].