September 21, 2022 0 comments

When competition is unhealthy

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One thing to know is that in the organic cotton lingerie market, we are dinosaurs. We were the first brand to launch. The competition was solely German. But in 2004, few people were interested in organic underwear. Except for environmentalists!

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Today, organic cotton can be found everywhere. All major brands have their exclusive organic cotton collections. That's good, the goal is still to democratize organic products and especially to shop responsibly.

Let me set the scene: today, organic lingerie is no longer an offer for just a niche. It's not reserved for elites or very informed people. It's an accessible product.

And that leads to competition

Beware, I'm not saying I don't want competition. A market with other offerings is a healthy market (except for period panties, but we'll come back to that).

Except that there are brands that have ethics and others that don't. And honestly, I think that's what annoys me the most. We don't have financiers demanding results from us. We move at our own pace, slowly but surely. I repeat, existing for 18 years, especially in textiles, is no small feat.

When my mother founded Peau-Ethique, she didn't just put her values in the name. We are truly an ethical brand.

But what a surprise it was when I typed into a major search engine to see that a brand had advertised on our brand name. All's fair in love and war, or is it just about easy money in the end?

Should we advertise on our brand name? To be ahead of competitors?

I know very well that this is the rule in e-commerce, but I have a lot of trouble with this way of working. Because it's precisely not ours. When you're a brand that sends newsletters without promo codes or new products, that's a concept too.

I'm asking myself, should we adopt this strategy at the risk of losing our ethics? Or do we continue as we are? Very honestly, Sara and I will continue in the same way as today. I especially tell myself that if I switch to that side of the business, we will lose all our ethics. And as already said, ethics are not just in our name!