From the beginning, Goodbyn has been guided by several principles that we strive to achieve as a company: safe & sustainable products, high levels of usability, loveable design... but one of our most important principles has been domestic manufacturing.
We knew up front that producing Goodbyns in the USA would be more expensive than producing them overseas. The point we were out to prove was that most other lunch products, as with any other consumer product market, are primarily produced overseas. Here are a few reasons why we chose to buck the system and support manufacturing in the USA:
Fair Labor & Quality of Living: Many overseas manufacturing facilities lack the ability to offer their workers a wage that permits them to live at a similar level to what Americans have the luxury of living. Our questions have always been: Was the product made by workers who make a fair wage? Do the workers and their families live on the factory grounds, or do they own their own home? Do they own a car? Do they have access to healthcare? Can they get a day off work to take their child to the doctor? Do they have an insurance policy that helps cover health expenses for themselves, their children, and, not to mention, their elderly relatives?
Product Quality / Oversight: Beyond the importance of a worker's life, when you produce overseas, a small company like ours has difficulty managing the quality of products produced. Materials become inconsistent, colors don't match, and some of the products shipped back to you (across the ocean) could potentially be defective. Also, all children’s and toy products sold in the USA now have to (thankfully) meet or exceed regulated, specified levels of chemicals under federal law. And, producing overseas requires massive oversight, just to ensure that all regulations are being consistently met. Don’t forget about the news stories over the past decade regarding foreign materials placed in kids' products, baby formulas, dog food and toothpaste.
Carbon Footprint: We chose to produce and ship Goodbyns in/from the Midwest. This is important, especially if you add up the resources needed to produce overseas. Overseas production directs that all goods ship on a barge from their port of origin to their US location. While this is the least expensive choice, its carbon footprint is large, and adds significant time to the delivery process. To keep our footprint to the minimum and our timing swift, we chose to keep it domestic and small: produce in Grand Rapids, ship 30 miles to Grand Haven, and pack and ship via USPS, UPS and FedEx directly to you.
Safety Standards: In the US, factories and the employees who work in them have the advantage of federal safety standards (ISO, OSHA, etc.). Most overseas facilities do not have to abide by these standards that we take for granted. What you're left with is an overseas business proprietor making his/her own rules, guided only by his/her belief in the satisfaction of their employees. Our fear is that in most cases, the proprietor's bottom line is king, and the facility's safety standards, well-being of workers, etc. trickle down from how they can cut a profit.
Sustainable Economy: Outsourcing is a questionable business practice, period. The decision to outsource is to reign in and reduce profit margins for the company's bottom line, as a whole. It is obvious that producing overseas (even though it travels for weeks or months across the ocean) allows companies to make more money. But what are the effects on the US economy? The truth is: when we were searching for manufacturers—even though we found a fantastic partner—the choices were very limited. We as American consumers have supported the basic idea of outsourcing because of bottom-of-the-barrel pricing. We've been taught to shop and choose items that are the cheapest on shelf.
Supporting the idea of fostering more manufacturing jobs, more fulfillment jobs, and more US business in general is where our minds go. The more manufacturing jobs return to the US, the more demand there is for US products. With more demand, the more competitive US manufacturing becomes in regards to costs. With lower costs, it becomes cheaper for our company to produce goods. And with cheaper costs of goods, the US-made lunchbox on the shelf wears a price tag that is much closer to the overseas-made lunchbox sitting next to it.
It's not about criticizing or infringing on other companies' beliefs, but rather what we feel in our heart-of-hearts is the right way to conduct business. Some people write us asking the basic question of price, and why in some stores our lunchbox costs more than the one next to it. We entirely understand that for most people, the checkbook determines what one can afford to buy for his/her child. We as a company do not benefit from a large profit margin; we usually find ourselves taking less in order to lower the final cost on the shelves.
What we ask is that consumers put on their inspection glasses, and really consider where a product was made. It may be, if it was made in the US, it might have a higher price tag than its imported counterpart.
Benefitting from a giant profit margin isn't as important as knowing that everyone involved in creating Goodbyn's products, as well as the people who buy them, enjoy the benefits of our choices as a company. We are proud of these choices, and we hope you are too.
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