Allied Feather & Down said it will promote the Textile Exchange’s Responsible Down Standard (RDS) developed by The North Face and debuted at Outdoor Retailer to its customers in the bedding industry at a trade show in New York City later this month.

 

Allied Feather & Down’s bedding division, Allied Home, is exhibiting at New York Home Fashions Market Week (Mar. 24-27) at 1400 Broadway, suite 1602 to debut Fall 2014 bedding collections, reveal innovative new Allied-branded technologies, and educate vendors on their responsible sourcing initiatives within the home market.

The RDS is a new standard set by the outdoor industry to audit and ensure the ethical treatment of all animals in its down supply chain and validate all claims through an established chain of custody process.  Allied was the first adopter of the RDS and plans to sell its ethically sourced down to the home market, in addition to outdoor.

The RDS was developed by The North Face in partnership with Control Union Certifications, an accredited third-party certification body, and Textile Exchange, a global nonprofit dedicated to sustainability in the textile industry. The North Face gifted the standard to Textile Exchange in an effort to affect change in the down supply chain through widespread adoption. Allied supported the development of the RDS by leading The North Face and Control Union Certifications through their global supply chain, evaluating conditions and identifying where auditing should take place.

Allied has also partnered with Control Union as their third party verification auditor for the Responsible Down Standard to certify that there is no live plucking or force feeding of geese, from gosling to finished product.

The goal of the Standard is to encourage industry-wide ethical business practices and transparency. It is Allied’s hope that manufacturing companies across the home and bedding industry will see the importance of purchasing down from a secure, ethical supply chain. Allied’s vendor partners have the opportunity to incorporate RDS Certified Down in their product lines for Fall 2015.  

“The Responsible Down Standard is one of many ways that we show our commitment to ethical business practices,” said Daniel Uretsky, COO of Allied Feather & Down. “We are constantly working to improve upon our supply chains to ensure we are on the forefront of environmental and ethical practices in the sourcing of down. We encourage the industry to follow suit.”

Allied continues to work on improving the way feather and down is procured for all the industries it supplies. Certifying the origin of down is a quality control system that Allied hopes to usher into the bedding industry via its Allied Home division.