According to Rapanui and Natimeo, ecology is not only that: shopping for clothes can be a way to invest yourself in the protection of nature and of humans !
A brief history
• Rapanui: a Isle-of-Wight based firm, founded by two brothers in their early twenties in 2008. Products: organic wear for men and women, produced in ethical factories, and energy-powered with wind turbines. The aim: make eco-fashion cool !Slogan : eco-fashion
Save our Seas T-shirt - Rapanui
• Natimeo: created in 2011, Natimeo is a brand of the group Decathlon (sportswear and equipment). They furnish Decathlon's other brands in ethical and organic wear. For example, the image on your left is a merinos wool shirt they produced for the brand Domyos.Slogan : "let nature wear you"
Natimeo Wool Shirt
An innovative presentation of products
Both firms have understood very well what is at stake in customer relationship management, and more globally in the new terms of concrete marketing.
• A global presentation of the issues of ecology
People might know what ecology is ... or not. This is why both Natimeo and Rapanui explain their general approaches to ecology and their business models in specific pages. Video and image devices are very nicely displayed on the Natimeo website, from the second you enter the adress http://www.natimeo.com/ in your browser.
The business model of Natimeo
The above video for example explains the steps of the Natimeo products, from the water used in the production of cotton to the final product.
The same global explanation is present throughout the Rapanui website, but their approach is more "product by product".
• Presentation of the products: both sites aim at making traceability of the product from A to Z possible. Both Rapanui and Natimeo for example display maps of where the products come from (where the plants where produced, where they are transformed in a tee-shirt), how they are transformed, how they come to the consumer
However, Natimeo's presentation is more tricky: they do not sell directly the products they make : the products are sold through the other brands of Decathlon. And, Decathlon does not yet use a traceability map for each of its product. Moreover, on Decathlon's website, there is no specific rubric for organic products / products coming from Natimeo.
Of course, when you stumble on a Natimeo product, it is presented as such, but I haven't yet found devices that lead the consumer directly to more these more ethical and ecological products.
On the other hand, Rapanui do sell directly their products. Guidance through the products is very easy and you nearly instantaneously the product you were dreaming of. Nevertheless, these is a limited number of products, especially of the collection for women.
However, for the existing products, details about the product are very thorough and each product has their own specific webpage, where the consumer can find the traceability map and additional information about the product (why bamboo is more ecology-respectful than cotton for example).
At the World Forum of Lille in november 2011, I had the opportunity of meeting with the founders of Rapanui, who took the time of explaining me their use of new technologies. For instance, the use of traceability maps was seen as an innovative device enabling the consumers to make a transparent choice.
The products of Rapanui are also sold in shops (38 independent retailers, and one owned shop) and making a transparent choice is there made possible by the use of QR codes. On each product, a QR code is attached, and linked to the traceability map of the concerned product. Therefore, the consumer can see, even if in a shop, where his / her product was made.
Similarly, both firms promote eco-labels, to give their targets an easy way of determining the environmental and social impact of the products.
Natimeo Rapanui
Both indicators are very similar: the use of an A to E (and even A to F scale for Rapanui) scale, with colors (green : good, red : bad), that make recognition instantaneous. The principle is the same than that for cars for example.
Let's note that for Rapanui, creating an eco-label, which can lead to a transparent choice for consumers, goes further than Natimeo: Rapanui has aims at creating a proposal to the European Commission, to extend the creation of this eco-label to the European level.
The various letters of the label can be translated into:
• A – organic ethical sustainable
• B – ethical with some work to sustainable
• C – ethical
• D – not bad, not good either
• E – needs improving
• F – some organic, ethical or sustainable
• G – not organic, ethical or sustainable
• B – ethical with some work to sustainable
• C – ethical
• D – not bad, not good either
• E – needs improving
• F – some organic, ethical or sustainable
• G – not organic, ethical or sustainable
(source : http://www.rapanuiclothing.com/ethical-fashion/eco-labelling-clothing.html)
• Proximity with consumers
How Natimeo and Rapanui reach out to their consumers is different:
- Social networks : Rapanui is present both on Facebook (2 081 fans) and on Twitter. They intensively use Facebook to direct consumers to their website, but the content is not perceived as spam: both the products and the ideas are presented, but not in a "commercial" point of view. It's more of a "hey ! Did you know that ?" communicational style. Moreover, adherents to the community benefit from regular discounts and information about the theme of ecology.
Natimeo is absent from Facebook and Twitter, a certain disadvantage. However, Decathlon, the final seller of products is very present on both networks, which helps nuancing this statement.
- Blogs. Both brands have understood that fixed contents are not the solution, and regularly produce updated content: the recent products, what the ambassadors are doing, discounts, commercial operations. Rapanui has even produced a Christmas documentary, very good initiative though the video itself (7:14 minuts) is rather long.
The Grotto documentary - Rapanui
- People. Obviously, both firms
have understood the importance of a quick customer service, and of the
availability of a material contact. It is therefore very easy to find, on both
websites, an email address. Moreover, the names and faces of people appear on the different pages of the website (for example, one of the co-founders of Rapanui appears as Father Christmas in the Grotto Documentary)
• Sports as a promotion tool
If Natimeo's final targets (through Decathlon) are sportsmen and women, the use of sport as a commercial argument is more exploited by Rapanui, who uses ambassadors (base-jumpers for example) to promote its brand and create a buzz !
• Rapanui's use of follow-up
There is an additional number of devices Rapanui use that Natimeo doesn't :
- A newsletter
An extract from a Rapanui newsletter (20th November 2011)
- When you order a product, you receive both an email when you have ordered it (to confirm the order) and an email when the product leaves Rapanui. This is quite classic, but what is not is the redaction of the emails, in a very informal tone :
"We will keep you updated via email on the progress of your order, which will be processed and shipped to you shortly via UK 1st Class Delivery.
For any questions meanwhile we're only a phonecall away." (extract from an email received from Rapanui)
- The redaction of the whole website is in this same tone. We can compare it to Natimeo's use of smileys on their website, partially aimed at constructing a close relationship with its consumers.
- You can ask for free Rapanui stickers
- You receive a hand-written note in your package. The person who wrote mine even noted that I come from France since he / she wrote a joyful "Bonjour" to salute me.
=> Conclusions
Ecology has clearly took on a new step, with new products that correspond to the customers' expectations. And new business models such as that of Rapanui can be combined to older models like Decathlon : it is not only recent startups that can understand the importance of preserving the planet !
Moreover, it seems that both Natimeo and Rapanui have understood the new principles of marketing, and of establishing an informal and complicity relationship between firms and customers. Natimeo's use of new technologies for marketing purposes is still hesitant, but the firm was created very recently, that is three years after Rapanui.
For Natimeo, the use of these new technologies stay undermined by Decathlon being the final seller of products. However, the similarities between both firms (the business-model, anchored around the notion of "circular economy" - see the Elen McArthur foundation for more information, the use of new customer relationship management, the use of informal communication tools, the use of traceability indicators) are astonishing, and might lead to a new marketing and business paradigm.
For more, see : http://www.rapanuiclothing.com/ and http://www.natimeo.com/
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