21 nov 5 MIN. JEANS EDUCATION: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT YOUR JEANS

You can’t know everything, but you need to know a few things about your jeans. That’s why we’ve provided a 5 min. education about your jeans… which startsss now!

The invention of jeans goes way back: in 1871 Jacob Davis strengthened a pair of pants with nails to prevent gold seekers from tearing out of it. This ended up in the pants we now know as jeans. Since then jeans has become one of the most popular clothing items in the world. In the Netherlands we buy 15 million jeans per year and have on average 5 pairs of jeans in our wardrobe… It is pretty clear: we people like jeans! BUT, and this is a BIG BUT: our jeans are really destructive for the environment & people. And this is why:

1. DIRTY CROP – Our jeans are made of cotton, which is a pretty dirty crop: Just 2.4% of the world cultivated land is planted with cotton, yet it accounts for 24% of the world’s insecticide market and 11% of sale of global pesticides. Therefore it is the most pesticide-intensive crop grown on the planet. 
2. TOXIC – Many chemicals are used when making jeans. We may not be bothered by this right now, but this has a huge impact on the environment and on people. For example, there are different rivers in India in which all chemicals of the clothes production are dumped. This is also the place where people get their drinking water from. As you can imagine this leads to many destructive health consequences. For the full story check the documentary ‘The True Cost’ on Netflix!
3. HIDDEN WATER – Our jeans consists of a lot of hidden water: the production of an average pair of jeans needs around 7000 liters of water. That is the amount of water we drink over a period of more than 10 years!

However, the good news is: this is all so bad that we can only do it better. So you can close the tap while brushing your teeth, but by consciously buying a pair of jeans, you can really move mountains! You can do this by buying less jeans, a vintage one or a pair of jeans from a sustainable and fair brand. A brand that shows jeans can be made in a good way is MUD Jeans.

CUT THE CROP #recycling

MUD Jeans decided to cut the crap, uh crop, by reducing the use of more dirty crops through recycling. Because: waste = new material! All MUD jeans contain post-consumer recycled denim and organic cotton: which means less use of dirty crop. How does the recycling work? Our worn out jeans are sent to factories in Spain. Here the jeans are shredded and mixed with new organic cotton. A new spun yarn containing recycled denim is born out of which new products are manufactured.

MUD jeans has set the goal to make jeans that are of 100% recycled fibers. Yet the current recycling techniques causes fibres to lose strength. So to make sure that you can wear your jeans without the fear of tearing out of your pants; a pair of jeans is now limited to 40% recycled content.

ALL ABOUT THE DETAILS

If you wear MUD Jeans you know for sure that they thought of every little detail. The starting point of their designs is recycling. That’s why they don’t make use leather labels but they use printed logo’s instead and buttons on knits are made out of recycled cotton. Because of this, MUD jeans is also vegan!

SPLASH

Instead of 7000 liters or more, MUD Jeans uses 1554 liter water for one jeans. So, with buying one pair of MUD jeans instead of a regular jeans you save 5446 liter water: which is equal to about 156 shower turns! If that won’t make your day… On top of that Yousstex International operates water recycling stations in their facility, in which they recycle up to 95% of the water they use.

BURN BABY BURN

Well, we neither most of the time… we want to have it all! Maybe you think this isn’t really consciously minded. And it isn’t: because on average, 30% of the garments in our closets have not been worn in almost a year. However, Mud Jeans has a great solution and shows that slow fashion doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to wear the same jeans over and over again. They started a new and unique formula in which you can lease a jeans. YUP, that right: lease! How does it work? You can choose a MUD Jeans and pay in 12 monthly installments of 7,50€. If you are a MUD jeans member, you can lease as many as three jeans at the same time! After one year, or when the jeans are worn out, you can send them back to Mud and try out a new pair. By leasing a jeans MUD jeans stays the owner of the raw materials and gets them back after use. 

KEEPS ON GOING

And there is much more to tell about this brand, like the fact that they…

…use as little chemicals as possible (in 75% of their jeans, there are no chemicals used at all);

…reduct the CO2 emission with 61%;

…send out products with RePack, a returnable and reusable packaging that can be reused up to 20 times.

But we have to keep our promise of our 5 min education so we’re going to finish.