Twoobs
We interview Jess and Stef, the founders of TWOOBS and How Two Live podcast.
Jess and Stef - we love TWOOBS! How did you come up with the unique TWOOBS style?
We were actually really inspired by sports kids shoes way back in our early days. TWOOBS came about for many reasons, the largest being how much we hated the stereotype that women need to wear uncomfy shoes to look good – think Carrie Bradshaw’s shoe wardrobe – STUNNING, but also stunningly uncomfortable. Kids still manage to look fabulous, but their shoes don’t get in the way of their enjoyment and play, so you’ll tend to see velcro, soft materials, and a flat sole. We’ve included all these qualities in TWOOBS, they’ll certainly make you look fab but they won’t be getting in the way of your fun.
The brand is 100% Carbon Neutral. Congratulations. How have you done this?
Why thank you! We made an important decision at the beginning of 2020 to completely overhaul our practices in response to the growing climate crisis. Prior to this we’d been tweaking things over time, but we really felt our response needed to be kicked up a notch or 10. Going carbon neutral was one of our first objectives, where we minimised the carbon footprint of the brand, by introducing new materials and finding suppliers within really close proximity to our factory, and then offsetting the remaining with our current partner Eco Cart.
How are the shoes delivered satchel free?
We also introduced this one last year. Radical concept really (yep, you’re detecting slight sarcasm) - shoes already come inside boxes, and for some odd reason online retailers, ourselves included, decided that the box should come inside a satchel. This makes no sense really if you think about it, it’s like putting packaging inside packaging…?! So now our box just comes sans satchel, it’s got some fancy flaps so it folds in and seals on itself, and we send it out as is.
The brand is produced in China. How do you ensure Fair Trade with suppliers?
Until last year we had actually been with the same suppliers since the beginning of our sampling process in 2015, we would visit regularly and formed a really close bond with our suppliers, so monitoring things were easier then. In 2020 we made the tough decision to find a new supplier who was able to help us achieve more of our environmental goals – but of course not being able to travel overseas we haven’t actually been to inspect our factory physically. This is where a third party audit starts to be really important, which we’re in the process of doing now. We’re proud that our current factory provides a living wage, and offers healthcare and childcare options.
How does the TWOOBS recycle program work?
It’s called Takesies Backsies, and essentially is a take back program where once a customer is all done with their TWOOBS and they’re on their last legs, they can send the shoes back to us for a $10 voucher. We then pass them onto our recycle partner who was previously turning them into warehousing and playground mats. We’ve actually put a pause on the recycling part of it to instead collect the shoes for now so we can start sample recycling them into yoga mats which is our dream for the program.
Your favourite pair of TWOOBS and how to style?
This question is like making someone pick a favourite child…. Buuuuut since you asked we are super excited about the newest addition to our range which is a slide called The Slidekick. The brown (or Jane Fondant as we call her) is our summer staple for sure, we basically haven’t taken them off since they arrived. We’ve been slipping them on with everything from busy days in activewear to friend hangs wearing an oversized shirt and denim cut offs.
We worked together when you were running How Two Live. Are you still blogging?
Haha how time flies right?! We ended up transitioning How Two Live (initially a blog for those who don’t know) into a podcast for the last few years. We just love to get our gab on but felt like between HTL and TWOOBS we were spread quite thin, so we’ve now paused that to focus on the new TWOOBS podcast launching mid November called Hey TWOOBS. It explores topics around sustainability and fashion in a fun way with eps like “Will my friends ever care about the environment”, and “Is sustainable fashion only for rich people”.
