Helping garment workers get paid better doesn’t have to mean paying more for your clothes. Karim said unnecessary “middlemen” drive up the price of clothing, and cutting them out can drop it.
“I was buying clothes that cost hundreds of dollars, and people in manufacturing get one-tenth of the price,” Karim said. “That really triggered me that there are improvements we can do in this space, especially in the supply chain.”
Cedar Valley Food Runner acquired by EatStreet
Dhakai is basically a shorter connection from small and mid-sized private label clothing brands to more than 500 “verified and compliant” clothing manufacturers, some of whom harvest rainwater, are LEED certified and pay living wages, said Karim. He says that saves brands at least 30% of sourcing costs while still giving more money to the factories.
Designers can also virtually tour factories and see what products they can make and at what quantities, as well as things like if they have solar power or day care facilities for their workers.
“This is a huge trend,” Karim said. A majority of millennials and Gen Z are “willing to pay more money if the product was sustained ethically.”
New urban streetwear boutique The Spot opens in downtown Waterloo
While working to start Dhakai in 2020, he met Cassandra Dittmer, a Muscatine native and celebrity stylist who cofounded the boutique CD Studio in partnership with Dhakai. The pair raised more than $10,000 on a recent Kickstarter initiative and plan to build 40 new drinking water wells in Bangladesh with a portion of the proceeds.
