Carlos Loredo
Guillermo Indriago
Leyla Magallan
Jaime Leal
EGADE Business School Tecnologico de Monterrey
Ezequiel Reficco
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Treeshoes was born with the idea of creating a product that was friendly to the environment and could also bring resources to people with limited with their earnings, both ideas were initially fulfilled according to their strategy, since the shoes and tennis shoes they produce, in addition to have a variety of designs and colors, are environmentally friendly materials, supporting their strategy, their processes are handmade decreasing the carbon footprint compared to common manufacturers. On the other hand, the company Treeshoes employs people of scarce resources for the design and manufacture of these.
For the year 2011 two young entrepreneurs who were concerned about the environment and started a project whose goal was to achieve the production of shoes that were completely biodegradable and friendly to the environment, that dream began operations in 2013 and currently 60% of the materials are friendly with nature, placing special emphasis on soles which are 100% biodegradable in 5 years. In addition to helping the environment through the use of friendly materials is through the initiative "Treekit", which is granted in each purchase and, whose goal is to raise awareness of the alarming environmental situation of the planet, this kit contains all the necessary elements (instructive, pellet and seeds) to plant a tree and in this way the clients are part of the movement; In addition, another of the actions of Treeshoes is, through the earnings of its operation, to give donations to non-governmental organizations such as Extreme Reforestation in Monterrey, to support its reforestation events. For the social part, the company employs personnel in unfavorable economic conditions as craftsmen are to carry out the design and manufacture of their products.
The idea to create Treeshoes appeared in 2011, still being students of design and industrial engineering since they were taking a university course they had to develop an innovative idea, hence the idea was born with four members, which step by step they were taking more seriously until they were convinced of their product. They did not create a shoe, they created a shoe concept that is how Alejandro Galarza refers to his product.
The overall impact of innovation is related to a variation of the actual products offered by the market and the business model than they are applying, being more specific with the usage of ecofriendly materials to the shoes sector. But also giving an impulse to the local supply chain using 100% Mexican materials and giving the job opportunity to local workers. Other way they are impacting by their business is through the support to a NGO and specially creating conscious to the customers with the “treekit” and education them.
Like their slogan says: “A Better World Step by Step”:
Treeshoes was created not to produce shoes they created the company to develop a shoe concept, that concept was pushed by their environmental strategy (the use of ecofriendly materials, “Treekit” and NGO) and they think that this product innovation is the key to open to new opportunities because they know that now days most people around the world have become more conscious about the sustainability and this niche of market is growing and this is supported by their yearly growth that showed an increase from 650 to 900 pairs from 2016 to 2017 and are projected to be around 1,200 by the end of this year. Also, they have diversified their logistics and availability of products because they passed to offer the shoes at traditional o physical artisans markets to be available to sell online and make partnerships with retailers.
Besides of the actual products they are planning to diversify their offer expanding their product offer to clothes were they had identified a new opportunity using the same kind of materials.
Treeshoes uses a traditional manufacturing process by hand and their actual process has a cycle time between 20 to 30 minutes that means that has a capacity of 40 to 50 pairs per day, so actually this is not an impediment to continue growing.
Treeshoes have very clear how do they cover the 3 aspects of the triple bottom line, regarding the environmental aspects the support some NGOs (Reforestacion Extrema) with some percentage of the sales to support their operations, but also because their product is eco-friend in the way that 60% of the material is biodegradable (100% of the shoe sole) between 3 and 5 years, also the use of other material like textiles are eco-friendly. Regarding the social the products use 100% of Mexican materials and also all the labor is done locally by artisans, but also the social they think that by creating conscious to the customers by the “Treekit” they can change the world, even if they only change the mind of one person.
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Alejandro Galarza, Treeshoes Oveview
Treeshoes is a Mexican company who designs and manufactures ecological tennis shoes through a very low carbon footprint by Mexicans artisians, also wants to drive awareness about reforestation through kits for planting trees and supporting environmentalists organizations.