Zuri is the Swahili word which means "Beautiful". Zuri Travel Crafts is a social enterprise with the aim to produce beautiful, colorful, fashionable, unique, traveling tags for the modern traveling consumer using Fabric samples supplied by Austin Creative Re-Use. Zuri Travel Crafts products will be created by mixing fabric samples, leather and printed textiles. These unique tags will make the consumer's luggage easy to identify. They will be easy to adjust due to the adjustable belt strap sewn on it, the leather and choice of fabric will increase or reinforce durability, and the textile print will make it bright and easy to be spotted. They will also include a space where the consumer will put his or her detail information.
We are confident that we will have enough to produce products for at least 6months to 1 year meanwhile we will be establishing relationships with other organizations like Austin Creative Reuse, other fabric stores, interior design studios, designers workrooms, liquidation shops and more. Also by applying the strategy of mixing with other materials other than donated ones, we are guaranteeing that our donated supplies will last even longer.
According to the US Traveling Association, direct spending by resident and international travelers in the U.S. is averaged at $2.6 billion a day, $108.1 million an hour, $1.8 million a minute and $30,033 a second. And this is the reason we chose travel tags because, this industry already is spending money and there is a need for creative, trendy and socially conscious travel tags that will be bring awareness in every destination that our consumer passes or travel to. We are interpreting our products on our customer's bag to be more of traveling tiny-billboards.
We intend to use the limited edition feature as our niche, so that we can leverage our price point. Many people like to purchase unique items and do not want to carry matching or similar things with others, so the limited editions on selected items will be a great marketing feature to make our goods unique and desirable. And we will also explain to our consumer that we are trying to be environmentally conscious.
Zuri Travel Crafts are not only travel tags but also a conscious movement aiming to have national and international attention while bringing awareness to re-use, re-purpose and upcycle message to our consumer and those who are curious about our products. Zuri Travel Crafts will also hold workshops, classes and meetups and continue to bring awareness at the same time increase fan and consumer base.
We are hoping to raise funds via crowdfunding events, different workshops, engage in various pitches, strategic partnerships with media networks, traveling companies and inkind donations. We will also engage on social media networks so as to give that trendy effect. This idea is valuable to our community and these un-used and discarded materials will be given new and exciting life.
Theo Shayo has her own clothing brand, called Shavanthe, where she designs clothing and accessories using prints and textile from around the world. Her knowledge of multicultural prints/textile will be viable in this venture as those prints will be added in .
Chris Douglas is a social enterprise enthusiast with seven years experience developing and managing sustainable, impactful projects in Texas and East Africa. Before joining Zuri for this year’s [Re]Verse Pitch Competition, Chris worked with farming cooperatives in South Sudan to launch their country’s first homegrown honey company and make natural honey their country’s first-ever export to the United States. Chris is also passionate about public advocacy for more social entrepreneurship in Austin and around the world.
These two people are great team and their skills set will complement the venture progressively.
The Zuri Travel Crafts will be designed creatively and manufactured here in Austin. Initially using donated materials initially from Austin Creative Reuse.
Fabric is a great resource and an expensive one too, getting these un-used and or discarded materials for free will help a lot with our production cost. When fabric samples donations are received by Zuri Travel Crafts, they will be sorted by texture, color, quality and composition. Then we will work on observing how those fabrics and other materials to be used in making the travel tags behave when touched, felt, draped, folded. Eventhough our primary product is Travel Tag, we will also explore on pillowcases, backpacks, book covers, purses, bags and pouches. To do all of that we need dedicated group of people such as immigrants, women and mothers who have huge employment gap and women who are on parole from light sentences.
Zuri Travel Crafts is highly committed to 100% sustainability and this is done by re-purposing fabrics, use sustainable textiles to help consumers and the community. The unused and discarded fabric samples being rescured from going to the landfills will be reused and generated new life out of them.
Every year, more than 120 million trees are cut down to make our clothing and other products. Our part will not only end by us making cool travel tags and sell them, but also provide education about the importance of recycling, upcycling, reuse and re purposing.
Zuri Travel Crafts intervene in this cycle of waste by recovering the scraps and using them that rescues high-quality, unused material and turns it into limited edition, hand-numbered goods.
Since our products will be durable and well made we will try to educate our community the value of buying $15 travel tag from the disposable and or cheap $5 tag, also point out that ours will have longer life cycle which intend to minimize over consumption and reduce post-consumer waste.
We aim to make our customers understand sustainable fashion, by engaging them and make everything more transparent and this way our consumers understand how they can play part in our environment.
We chose this products because it will travel national and international and our customers will be our ambassadors in spreading that awareness.
In order to make a profit and stay in business, we need to have a plan about the product's end of life cycle. We will make efforts to engage with our customers and collect and recycle old products; And we will continue to design products that they can be easily recycled. Customers who will recycled their old products will get percentage off or coupon for their new purchases.
These products will be collected and recycled on a voluntary basis. The associated increase of dismantling costs can be offset by the additional recycling material revenues.
Zuri Travel Crafts will help reduce fabric waste, while fostering connections with consumers and the community. Also we will run a crowdfunding campaigns to fund our first store and co-shared workshop place in Austin Texas which allow for growth and collaboration with other designers and makers and our committed employees. All the design, production, photography, workshops, events, sell of products , shipping and logistics will be done at the same place and this will be great approach in engaging our consumers and our partners in what we do.
