Latest / The Growth Class with Phil Masiello / Movement Building Strategies: Growing Mission-Driven Organizations with Carlos Carvalho

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Movement Building Strategies: Growing Mission-Driven Organizations with Carlos Carvalho · The Growth Class with Phil Masiello

• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everybody, and welcome to another growth class.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: And today on the show, we're talking about building real community power in businesses that stand for something.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: My guest is Carlos Carvalho, founder of One Movement.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: Carlos is a longtime organizer, turned entrepreneur who co-founded a social enterprise dedicated to top-tier ethical, locally made custom branding apparel.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: He's a guy who values practical problem solving and execution over hype.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: And Carlos, welcome to the show.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: So let's just dive right in and get to it.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thank you very much.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: More of that.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you very much for that uh for that intro.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: Your your check is in the mail.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Phil.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I really appreciate I really appreciate being asked to come on.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, my pleasure.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: My pleasure.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for taking the time.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh why don't you take us back and give us a little bit of history on you know what you've done in the past and how you got to where you are, a little bit about who you are and you know, that type of thing.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, so uh for your listeners, I'm actually um kind of uh um I'm in Vancouver, Vancouver, Canada.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um originally born in Montreal.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm one of those uh Canadians, the traditional Canadians that speaks both of our national languages.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um but uh have been um stationed out here on the West Coast in beautiful Vancouver, British Columbia for um almost 20, yeah, coming up on 25 years, and I love it out here.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm very lucky.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: I got started um kind of doing activism slash kind of union work at a pretty young age, um, at 20 years old.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: I got tapped on the shoulder, realized that there was um some opportunities within uh the labor movement for some professional growth, but also um a whole bunch of personal growth.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: And really kind of what you said um about me and something that I kind of bought into really young was um I saw some opportunity to do good work for good people um at a really young age.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's kind of what my life since about 20 has been devoted to, um, is really trying to help folks in our communities that are already doing good work, is try to help them build their movements um and try to help them kind of engage different types of people.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think that's something that I've always been kind of good at.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: So so T, what's your just explain about your business and what it is that you guys do and and what the website is.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: And uh you sell in the US as well because you're uh there's a US and a Canadian side to your website.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um we actually have quite a few uh partners in the US, which is great.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um so the company is One Movement Threads.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um many folks just go with One Movement.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: Our website is onemvmt.com.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we started about eight years ago, um, and we're coming up on nine years.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: And when we started, I'll be honest, um, it was kind of we were thinking, how can we help unions print t-shirts?
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like print some really cool t-shirts and hats, give them access to merchandise um that is ethically made, but is actually like stylish.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you can imagine, Phil, when I started when I was doing when I was 20 and I was going to union conventions, they were handing out like denim shirts that like denim's kind of back in right now, but then like as a 20-year-old being handed a denim shirt with a massive union logo on it, and now I was just thinking, like, who is wearing this?
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like, there must be there must be a better way.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then many years fast forward uh when we started the company, it was that it was trying to fill a gap.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: I saw myself um as a union executive at the time, found that the the products and services and kind of the access um that we were being offered wasn't where I thought it should be.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so myself and my partner Steve, um, we kind of got together, wrote out a plan on the back of a paper napkin, the way I think most plans um are written, or maybe now they're they're done on a tablet or something.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that was kind of the start of it.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: We wanted to start off just by getting good quality, preferably Canadian or American-made shirts for unions.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, it's really expanded since then.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we're really thankful, thankful of that.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: So when you say you were a union executive, like what were you doing?
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: So um, like I said, I started uh doing kind of the the cheesy union thing, um, the devoted worker advocate stuff when I was 20.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so Were you working were you working in a field and you became uh part of a union and then Exactly.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so I was um my first kind of like on the tools job, um, folks in the labor movement would say, um, was a city worker.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I was putting water mains in the ground.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I did that for 11 years.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then throughout that, throughout those 11 years, I was volunteering for my union on the union executive, and then kind of near the end of the 11 years, I had taken on more of a kind of full-time role, um, partial, part-time, full-time role with the union.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: And that gave me the opportunity to then move on and move different positions.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I worked in the nonprofit sector as well, um, kind of being a labor representative in the nonprofit sector.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's where, you know, that's where my ties are.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's where I'm rooted.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and saying my business partner is the same thing.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, he's been rooted in kind of the the labor movement here on the West Coast um at a very young age.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's actually kind of our um that's the secret sauce behind one movement, if I'm being totally honest, is that we come we actually come from the movement.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't go to school um to become business entrepreneurs.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: We started this because there was a need to start it, and I think that's why it's growing.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: So were you putting in water mains on the West Coast or in Montreal?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: On the West Coast.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, on on the West Coast.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, started at 20 water mains and then yeah, just kind of learning about city infrastructure and doing all that kind of stuff, which now it's funny because it it feels it's been it's been almost 12 years actually since I've been kind of off the tools.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um and it feels like a different like a lifetime ago, but I still have those kind of city worker habits, you know.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: I d I still drink black coffee and um I still like getting my hands dirty and I still wear I still wear my plait.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: So so um just explain a little bit about how uh how one movement dot com uh sort of benefits the the labor movement because you're really it's an e-commerce site, you're selling all kinds of things um that can be customized, right?
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: I could get I could send you a logo, you can customize it and send me, you know, whatever you sell, I can customize it for my logo, right?
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: So how does that sort of go back to the mission?
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um so it's funny.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: So I think it in a lot sometimes people might look at like if I say unions, and we kind of get pigeonholed, and folks might look at it as somehow different than any other type of like brand or um company or organization.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: But the reality is, you know, like unions are just um volunteer-driven organizations that are trying to connect and support their audience and their members, um, much like um any kind of company that's trying to speak to a specific audience.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so the way merch helps with that um is because if a union member is proud of the clothing that they're wearing, I always say the real test is it's easy for me to put a union logo on a piece of clothing and guarantee that somebody's going to wear that to a union meeting or a convention or a rally.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: But the real win and the real ROI is when we make a union t-shirt, a sticker, a cool hat, a hoodie, whatever it might be.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: And the union member is wearing that to the grocery store.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: The union member is wearing that to the pub, the union member is wearing that to a concert because that's just how cool it is.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I think that's something that we've been really focused on is kind of we can absolutely take your logo the way it is and put it on anything that you want, but we really try to help folks build their movement.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: So we've gone from very much being kind of a merch and promo company, um, promotional company is like the traditional kind of sector that we fall into, but we're very much more a movement-building company.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: So we don't just do the t-shirts and the stickers.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we also build websites, we produce podcasts, we will help unions, we'll do come in and do training for a union.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um we'll help um we'll help unions, nonprofits, anybody that'll have us in the room, we're there to help them build their movement much more than just print stuff for them.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: I see.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: So you're you're more of a uh sort of like a marketing agency for uh unions and nonprofits.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh really in Canada though, right?
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: Not so much in the States or In the States too.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we've actually made some of my co some of my um most fun uh products that we've made actually have been for some of the unions uh in the U.S.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: We've done a bunch of work with the United Steel Workers um scattered across the United States and would work with anybody.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I would argue that we're probably in North America the most rooted in labor company that's doing what we're doing.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um I know that for a fact in Canada, but I would say probably uh in the United States um as well.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think you know, when we make a website for uh a union or when we make shirts and logos and help unions with branding, it really feels union driven and not like you've just gone to another marketing firm.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: I gotcha.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um so but when you say that um that unions are sort of volunteer driven, it's not really, right?
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Because you join a union, you make a concerted effort to join a union, don't you?
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then you pay for that.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: So a lot of folks I I think you know they get a job and then they find themselves to be a part of the union.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: I think as, you know, there are some unions, um, the Longshoremans union um across North America is one where people kind of be become a member of the union before become getting employed.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: But many of us, myself included, um, you know, I got a job at 20 years old at the city.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I went from earning eight bucks an hour um at a car dealership to then earning$20 an hour as a laborer at the city.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: And then I found myself all of a sudden I was a union member.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so yeah, so you didn't have to join, you didn't have to join the union right away?
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: Nope, just being getting the job that I got at the employer that I got the job at, it was a unionized position.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't that I just became a union member because of the job.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the majority of how like union members become union members.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like I would say, unfortunately, and this is something that one movement tries to tries to help unions with, a lot of union members don't even know they're members of a union.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: Like that's that that that is the reality.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's a an engagement challenge that um we try to really address and and we take seriously.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: So when I say they're volunteer driven, it's because yes, the union does get dues from the from the members, but most unions don't have full-time paid staff that run the union.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's driven, it's run at the very top, like the provincial and national levels, they have staff.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: But once you kind of go down to the front lines um and you like the frontline workers, a lot of their unions, like the union executives, are made up by 10 to 15 volunteers from the workplace.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: They might be getting like 20 bucks a month as a stipend, and and that's about it.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: Are you talking about like the the um like the guys on the job that are the union reps or the union their volunteer?
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're getting paid because they're working and they're they're part of the union, but they volunteer to be the union rep or they volunteer to be the you know, the interface with management or something like that.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, if you you've probably heard the term like shop stewards, right?
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like a lot of shop stewards and yeah, they're they're working for the company, right?
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: But then they're volunteering their time, you know, much the same way.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and we work with a lot of nonprofits, much like a lot of nonprofits are also run by volunteers, right?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: These are people that they have a day job, they've got everything else, but this is something that they do off the side of their desk.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so why that's important to us um and how that like, you know, is a challenge to us in this market, um, is because you know, they don't have a lot of those, they they don't have a comms team that is sending us developed logos, you know, that are like coming and that we just have to take one file and kind of move that over.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: We have to do a lot of kind of the work where we're literally, I'm sure uh your listeners can imagine, um, you know, like when people are literally doing like clip art type logos, and it's like, hey Carlos, we'd really like something like this.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: And then we're having to actually create um the logo.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's something that because we work with so many volunteers, that's where we can our expertise and our experience actually really comes in handy because it's I find it's easier for me to kind of imagine what a steel worker is going to want in a logo, you know, just because uh I understand the language.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: Gotcha.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, my it's funny.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh uh my son graduated um college about uh two years ago uh as a photographer.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh well, he he graduated with a um a degree in journalism, but he really likes the photography side, the the the videography and the photography side of it.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: And he went to work for a station out in uh New Mexico.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: It lasted about a year.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: Then he got recruited to come back this way.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: We're in uh on the east coast of of the U.S.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and he he loved it, but it was like they were just he was just working a ton of hours, right?
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: And he used to complain that he doesn't he didn't have time to take a lunch.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't have time to take a lunch, he'd have time to take a lunch.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so he was working like 12, 14 hours a day.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: He was getting paid for it, and he was getting paid well, and he wasn't complaining about that side of it.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: But then he got recruited again down in the bigger market.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: Same same parent company, different station in the parent in in this different market.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: And that was a union house for uh photographers and um videographers and some other some other people.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so he was happy because he joined the union right away and he's guaranteed a lunch break.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: So happy because you know, that was his biggest gripe about he doesn't care about how many hours he works, he just wants to be able to take a lunch break.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: And uh because he does get paid.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, he gets paid very well for what he does, and he's and he's good at it and he likes his job and all that stuff.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: But I thought it was funny because I never would have thought, you know, in that mar in this particular market, um, there's not a lot of union industries anymore.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like we used to have steel manufacturing here, we used to have coal, we used to have uh, you know, uh auto manufacturing, and they're all gone.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, I I never thought that like television news stations would have a union component to it.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it's um that I mean, and you know, like so I think there'd be many workers here too that would have that same kind of um experience in a lot of different sectors.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I think, you know, like to put on the political hat, it's kind of scary to think that workers like aren't getting a paid lunch, right?
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I mean, it's weird to think about oh, this is what a worker might think is awesome perk to get is just like a lunch break.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like really that should be one of those things that you know we we both live in very rich countries.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, it just you know it should be one of those things that are guaranteed.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: But like that's for my that's my when I change my hat and I put on my political hat um to talk about that kind of stuff.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the problem was he was covering um the state house.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was just going, and there was it was budget time and there were a lot of meetings, and so he was covering the statehouse, and it was just going 12 hours, 14 hours.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: So like he wasn't able to stop and have a lunch break because there was nobody else to do it, right?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so that was really the problem.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: And now he's c now he's covering the national statehouse or the national congress and all that stuff, but he's guaranteed to take a uh to take a lunch break, and so he's he's happy about that.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: He always got paid for it, but he's just happy that he's actually because he he it used to bother him that he didn't get a chance to eat and he was losing weight and he didn't want to lose weight.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: So you know what's funny?
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I find um, and that this is something that I think I've gotten better at over time.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm 42 now um and actually about to go on this leadership conference that's held here every four years uh in Canada where it kind of brings together labor people and business people.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: And um I think when we talk about workers and we talk about like when I talk about engaging workers, I don't really think it matters if it's union or non-union.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: I think workers are workers.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: Like if you're a part of the working class uh in your country or my country, I I think you know you're a part of that working class.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I think, you know, whether it's a union or a nonprofit or whomever's trying to engage workers, like yeah, there's a way to do that.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: Like I like I my experience has been that workers are a lot smarter than people give us credit for.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: And um, so we can usually tell when something is kind of fake.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one thing one movement doesn't do.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um we don't fake where stuff's from, we don't change tags on stuff, we'll tell you exactly where it's from, we'll tell you how mad we are that more stuff isn't made domestically in Canada, the United States.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then we'll just make cool swag.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: Like we'll make cool swag, cool websites, um, lots of lots of different tools and really try to help people grow their movement.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because you know, for better or for worse, we're not working with the Walmarts of this world.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we're working with the kind of the smaller groups and we want to help them grow.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I mean it's interesting that um, you know, it's easy for everybody to say, oh, you know, buy, buy domestically, buy domestically.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: But the problem is that there's some things that you just cannot buy domestically.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a big fan of buying domestically, uh, not just for political reasons, but because, you know, it's just the turnaround time.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like when I was I I was in I I had a shaving brand and we manufactured the the the company that that was providing our razor manufactured in uh Tennessee, which wasn't very far.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: So if we had problems with inventory, ran out, you know, things were going really well, uh we could get to get it really quickly.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: If you're manufacturing across the water in someplace else, I mean it's uh 35 days on the water.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh you know, a minimum of whatever, how many units, and it just takes forever.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so from from a business perspective, yes, it it makes total sense to buy domestically, not just you know, because of uh uh you know, you want to support your national economy, but also because from a business perspective, the turnaround is so much better.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't care what the price is, right?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: Because I the the the cost of lost sales to me was always factored in there.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so but it's not so easy, right?
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we have a client now who's who manufac who uh sells electric uh razors and uh they have a unique product.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, they're bringing it in from overseas.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: And it, you know, it was 35 days on the water.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: It was then it took another 15 days to clear customs and to get out to the warehouse.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's uh that's just ridiculous.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, I went looking for them to say, hey, let's find somebody locally to do this.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: Unfortunately, there isn't one.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: There's no place in the United States that you can get an electric shaver manufacturer, right?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: You can white label somebody else's, but you can't get theirs done.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_00: There's no like that system isn't set up, which is sort of unfortunate because uh it would be so much, it would be so much better, so much easier.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it would be ultimately less expensive.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I I mean, the amount of manufacturers that I sp speak of speak to and like try to because a lot of manufacturers will have like one little piece of what they make will be onshore and then but the majority of what they make is offshore.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm constantly advocating, um Um, to say, like, hey, bring more of that stuff on shore.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: Selfishly, like it means I can offer more products to our clients, right?
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I want that.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I also want more jobs here.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I of course I want more things to be made here.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: I think it it's ultimately it's good for all of us to have more work here um locally.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I think, you know, for so many years, so many, so many, so many years, so much of the the talent and the money, um, the uh the technology has been driven offshore that yeah, like it it's hard to compete.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like we we use a hat manufacturer, like all of our hats are Canadian made.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: We we do the designing, so they're the Union Design Canadian made.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: There's like two Canadian hat manufacturers.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: Two and like you know what sucks?
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I I wish it was quick to make them here, because there's only two.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: If you come to us for a Canadian-made hats, they're the best hats you can find that are made in Canada.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: I guarantee it.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: They take six to eight weeks to make.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: Because there's only two manufacturers in like it's I wish there, I wish there was more, but there simply isn't.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: So a lot of clients, if they're not willing to wait, you know, because they're volunteer-driven organizations, that you know, they're doing things, uh-oh, Labor Day's coming.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: I need hats like in two weeks.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's not because they want to, but they're like forced into buying things that are made offshore, and then that just feeds into the problem of stuff not being made domestically.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm sure that's the exact same in the States.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: I know it is because we work a lot of our stuff, frankly, is made more in the United States than it is in Canada.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, uh, there's no question about it.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: I actually have a friend who um makes uh pet uh pet accessories.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh she started out making dog collars and dog leashes out of recycled uh tire tubes, uh uh bicycle tire tubes, because she started out as an environmentalist.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: And then she just started expanding, and now she is the largest manufacturer in the United States of plush toys for dogs, for animals.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so they don't have plastic in them, they don't have anything harmful in them.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: And she manufactures all her collars and leashes, you know, and it's a small thing.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: But when you think about that industry, when you go into like a Petsmart or some or a Petco and you start looking at all that, I mean, 90% of that category is manufactured overseas.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: So she's doing it here.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: And actually her pricing is not that much diff different.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: The only difference is because she's using recycled uh bicycle tire tubes, her stuff lasts for like forever.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, it becomes even if it's a dollar or two dollars more, you're not replacing that dog leash in that collar every couple of years.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: So and it's fully washable and all that stuff.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, it's a it's it's it's interesting, and I'm all for it because I hooked her up with another friend of mine who has uh pet stores.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, one of his biggest problems was getting timely deliveries because, like I said, you know, you're ordering the stuff and it takes forever to get here.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway, yeah, it's unpredictable too, right?
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like the um the stuff coming in from offshore.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, yeah, it's the timeline that even when you get the timelines, they can be so unpredictable, especially these days, right?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: There's so many different factors that we would way rather like to if there's any manufacturers listening, please make more stuff domestically.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Please, we will buy it, we will sell it.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: Please, please make more stuff here.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, it's interesting.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the whole textile industry is is pretty much gone from from from North America, I think.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: But um, we're we're pretty much out of time.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: I enjoyed the conversation.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: I thank you for coming on.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, any last words?
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: Again, why don't you reiterate your uh your website, let people know uh you know how to get in touch with you on the website and uh yeah, absolutely.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: So if folks can go to our website, it's one and then mvmt.com.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: So the word one and then mvmt.com.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: You can search for us on all things social media at one mvmt.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um if you'd like to get a hold of me, I am at say hi to Carlos on all things social media.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: Always willing to talk to anybody interested, kind of in whether it's uh the building, like movement building kind of uh work, or you just want to get some t-shirts made, um, we are there for and would love to help good people make good things.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you very much for having me on, Phil.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is a great conversation.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: My pleasure.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you taking the time.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: And uh everybody, we will see you next time.