A Team of Friends

Hey guys,

 

I’m Lars, the founder behind the Berlin backpack label Fitz & Huxley. The idea for Fitz & Huxley was born in 2012 when I was looking for a stylish non-sports backpack for every day and couldn’t find anything nice but fully suitable for everyday use. No matter how long I searched, I couldn’t find anything without plastic-like materials, but with enough storage space and that also convinced me visually. I started to make contacts in India through friends and after a long search I found a production partner who shared my ideas of beautiful, high-quality, natural materials and could meet my high demands on environmental and social standards. The first prototypes were created and I became more and more sure of my cause. I gathered all my courage and my savings and ordered 400 backpacks. I feverishly counted the days for three months and then flew to India myself to inspect the first production batch. Unfortunately, to my great disappointment, the first backpacks produced didn’t look nearly as great as the prototype and I wasn’t sure why. I was devastated.

 

[…Continued below…]

 

Over the next few days, I checked every single backpack and analysed the problem: while the seams, rivets and leather on my very first backpack in Berlin were perfect, here the leather had got scratches in the production process, rivets were partially damaged and the reinforcement of the backpack was not sewn straight so that some backpacks did not look radiantly beautiful but sadly bent. So the sum of the details made the difference. I rebooked my flight and stayed in India for three more weeks to repair or replace the backpacks together with the production team. That was in 2016, and since then I have never tired of demanding the highest standards and demonstrating what distinguishes a Fitz & Huxley from an ordinary backpack – that is, an object you carry on your back to carry things from A to B.

Just like our products, the team is the sum of its parts: we live a culture of openness and trust where it’s about the best products for our customers but also the meaning for each and every one of us. It is also everytime a great feeling when we spot a Fitz & Huxley on the street. It makes us proud to see how far we have come as a team of friends. Since the start in 2016, we have been doing one thing above all: in the spirit of slow-fashion and as a counter-design to the many sporty variants, we make beautiful backpacks from high-quality, natural materials paired with functionality for every day. And we do it with all our passion and meaning – in Berlin, the most exciting city in the world (at least for us) 🙂

Yours Sincerely,

 

- Lars


Socially and Ecologically
Responsible Production

Fitz & Huxley is an alternative to ever faster product life cycles and disposable fashion – in other words, “fast fashion”. For us, sustainability is not a marketing buzzword, but a self-evident secondary condition of all our actions. We make beautiful, high-quality and functional backpacks – and that is the focus – but we and you would not be able to enjoy our beautiful products if they were not made in an ecologically and socially responsible way. We deliberately don’t plant trees or anything like that. Instead, we care about a truly sustainable supply chain. To underline our high environmental and social standards, our production is SEDEX and SA8000 certified. In addition, we work hard to further optimise the sustainability of our products by developing existing materials and testing new ones.

 

140 People and their families live from the production of our backpacks

Over the years we have built up a family relationship with our production partner in India. Our producer is an integral part of the Fitz & Huxley story: it is only through our partner’s mutual trust and enthusiasm for our product concept that we have been able to realise our backpack designs while meeting the high standards we set ourselves. We visit our factory in India regularly and work with the team on site to further develop processes and products. For us, it is a matter of course that all employees can make a good living from their work and that good and meaningful working conditions prevail. Sometimes we hear the reproach why we would produce in India and not in Germany. But: for us, an Indian family that lives from backpack production is just as important as a German one. By now our Indian Fitz & Huxley team is about 140 strong. That means 140 people and their often many-headed families live from the permanent employment for the production of Fitz & Huxley backpacks and bags. We are very proud of that!

"In my early days I used to hop from one factory to other in search of work. Managing a group of skilled stitchers and looking after their livelihood was a big challenge as in most of the company there was not enough work. Since the day I shifted base and started making bags for Fitz & Huxley I never had to look back. This is the first time in my career that I have been working in the same place for more than a year. The credit goes to Fitz & Huxley for care and focus on our welfare. We also get our dues on time and support from the management."

 

- Najimuddin

"All of us are casual labour mainly into cleaning and packing of Fitz & Huxley bags. We are especially excited to see the huge range of colours of the bag and also it looks so cute."

 

- Sipra, Sultana, Tabassum, Munni, Ratna, Monjura, Sandya

"All of us here have made many kinds of bags in the past but being a part of Fitz & Huxley production team gives us more thrills. The brand is young, the owner is young and we are young."

 

- Saddique, Shakeel, Imroz

"In my early days I used to hop from one factory to other in search of work. Managing a group of skilled stitchers and looking after their livelihood was a big challenge as in most of the company there was not enough work. Since the day I shifted base and started making bags for Fitz & Huxley I never had to look back. This is the first time in my career that I have been working in the same place for more than a year. The credit goes to Fitz & Huxley for care and focus on our welfare. We also get our dues on time and support from the management."

 

- Najimuddin

"All of us are casual labour mainly into cleaning and packing of Fitz & Huxley bags. We are especially excited to see the huge range of colours of the bag and also it looks so cute."

 

- Sipra, Sultana, Tabassum, Munni, Ratna, Monjura, Sandya

"All of us here have made many kinds of bags in the past but being a part of Fitz & Huxley production team gives us more thrills. The brand is young, the owner is young and we are young."

 

- Saddique, Shakeel, Imroz

Use of Natural Materials

Our products are made from high quality, natural materials. We use genuine leather and cotton to produce beautiful, high-quality bags that look better and better over time. Our quality assurance team inspects every single backpack before shipping to guarantee the quality of our products. Products that don’t meet our standards are not are not thrown out, but are found a second life. For our vegan customers, we have a selection of products in the typical Fitz & Huxley design, where the leather is replaced by cotton.

Plastic-Free and Climate-Neutral Shipping

We attach great importance to acting sustainable and our goal is to minimize the ecological impact during production and shipping.

 

We ship plastic-free and our shipping boxes grow on the meadow! You read that right! We ship our products in a box made from 40% regional grass and 60% recycled paper. The use of rapidly renewable grass for cardboard production minimizes the consumption of fresh fibers, which are obtained from wood. This protects the important resource of wood which is good for forests and the climate. Furthermore, the grass used for this carton is grown on local meadows. This local supply concept achieves a eco-balance with up to 50% less CO2 emissions compared to traditional procurement methods for fresh fibers.

 

In addition, we ship our products climate-neutral with DHL GoGreen. 

Bags made to last long

Has your bag been your partner in crime on many urban adventures? We make our products as durable as we can by using strong materials in a seasonless design, but it´s possible that after a while you want a bit of a change. Therefore, we offer colourful cords and buckle replacements, so you can use your Fitz & Huxley for years. You can find more information on how to care for your products here.

Products that get a second Chance

It can happen that during production some products end up with little beauty flaws, such as tiny scratches in the leather or small stains on the canvas. Rather than throwing these products out, we choose not to waste the materials and instead find them a second life. Most often we sell these “Class B Products” at local Christmas and Designer markets to customers for a reduced price. However, we always reserve a portion of our Class B Products to donate to people who would be happy with a new backpack, but don´t have the means to buy one themselves.

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