Belstaff, Hush, Nobis are focused on doing good for Black Friday

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Nov 20, 2020

While Black Friday is best known for its bargain-hunting frenzy, a number of brands are using it as an opportunity to do good with a focus on helping the homeless. Belstaff, for instance, is set to donate 10% of all full-price sales over the three-day weekend to The Big Issue Foundation.

That foundation helps homeless people in the UK earn an income and follows a Belstaff promotion this spring that saw the high-end label saying it would donate a jacket for every jacket that it sold online. It added that it was able to provide 350 jackets for homeless people as a result.

The company said that instead of offering discounts this Black Friday, it would rather continue to support the most vulnerable people. 

Meanwhile, fashion and lifestyle brand, Hush has partnered with Crisis for a Black Friday charitable campaign, donating 20% of all online sales for 24 hours to the new ‘Connect for Crisis’ initiative. The aim is to help equip the UK’s homeless community with the tools and knowledge needed to rent successfully and find somewhere safe to live. 

Hush is a long-term partner of Crisis in its “ongoing goal to end UK homelessness and ensure that the UK government provides more low-cost housing to the vulnerable people that need it most”.

It said the decision to not take part in Black Friday is so that it can use “ this opportunity to focus on a more meaningful project”. 

And Canadian  premium outerwear brand Nobis has launched an international charity campaign called ‘No Cold Shoulder’. The charity drive “aims to upcycle gently used winter jackets and get them on the shoulders of the most vulnerable members in local communities”. 

It started on November 20 and wants to keep upwards of 15,000 people around the globe warm this winter season,” said Robin Yates, VP and co-founder of Nobis. 

Consumers can order a resealable, biodegradable donation mailer bag with pre-paid postage from its website “to encourage the donation of a gently worn coat to a local charity in need”. 

In the UK, the list of local charities partnering with stockists include Greaves with The Salvation Army (Glasgow), Stuarts with The Upper Room (London) and Phillip Browne with St Martins Housing Trust (Norwich).

Additionally, £50 from any Nobis Jacket purchased from Nobis.com in November will be donated to charity and it will donate 100% of the e-commerce sales of specific No Cold Shoulder merchandise to The Salvation Army

The campaign is being supported Nobis global brand ambassador and actor Giacomo Gianniotti.

And another brand focusing on causes for the event is Allbirds, which we reported on earlier. It's raising its prices by £1 and donating the proceeds to the fight against climate change.

It's an interesting approach that's gambling on the label's eco-aware customers being committed enough to the idea of slow fashion and the environment to be prepared to pay a little more for a limited period of time.