Haiti Made Blog / News

Introducing Haiti Made FC! This past month we had the pleasure of organizing a Haiti Made soccer team for a local soccer tournament headed up by Pastor Lex at Mission of Hope in Grand-Goâve. The team sported AC Milan-esque uniforms which feature a color scheme and style similar to Haiti's historic red and black national colors. The team performed very well, achieving a final record of 3-1-2 and making the top 8 in the tournament before losing in the knockout round.

Peterson and Claudeson served as the team's coaches. The team itself consisted of Jonas, Fendy, Wodlin, Romy, Michel, Parker, Jameson, Louines, Avril, Luckson, Erick, Etzer, Schnayder, Eberson, Filius. Haiti Made's Haiti Operations Coordinator, Parker Touchton also pitched-in and played a few matches too! We are very proud of how they all performed together, with a high level of fair play and teamwork. We can't wait to see how they'll do at the next tournament!

Like almost everywhere else in Latin America and the Caribbean, soccer is the most popular sport in Haiti. So the next time you are in Haiti, make sure you know a couple of soccer related words in Haitian Creole!

Here's a small cheat sheet of soccer related words in Creole for you!

• Soccer = Foutbòl
• Game = Jwèt
• Field = Teren
• Ball = Boul
• Goal = Gòl
• Kick = Choute
• Kick the Ball = Choute Boul La
• Pass = Pase
• Pass the Ball = Pase Boul La
• Coach = Antrenè
• Player = Jwè
• Forward = Avannsant
• Midfield = Milye Teren
• Defense = Defans
• Goalkeeper = Meyè Gadyen
• Team = Ekip
• Win = Genyen
• Lose = Pèdi
• Champion = Chanpyon

Most who know us and have visited us in Grand-Goâve will know that Haiti Made operations were proudly based at Ikondo, the upscale hosting facility and initiative founded by the Hands and Feet Project. Since the beginning of this year however, Haiti Made operations have moved from Ikondo to a larger facility just outside of Grand-Goâve proper at Taïno Beach. The effort put forth in moving our operations has been considerable, but through these changes we are very excited for what the future holds.

We are grateful to Ikondo for these past few years and for our partnership that allowed us to grow to the company we are today in 2018. Our facility at Ikondo was a truly beautiful space for us to house our operations and for Haiti Made staff to blossom their skills and creativity. The Ikondo facility also allowed guests to get an up-close and personal experience of Haiti Made operations and production processes, which is something that few other companies can say they offer. (FYI - visitors of Ikondo, Hands and Feet, or anyone in the Grand-Goâve area are free to visit us at our new facility!)

As our 2017 year in review post attests to, we’ve undergone significant growth over the past year and a half, which required us to increase our staff size and overall output. The growth left us with the clear need for more facility space which would allow us to boost our production output and quality, while ensuring our staff could continue to thrive.

With immense blessing, we were able to source a larger facility just a few miles down the road from Ikondo at Taïno Beach, and now we can proudly call this facility our new home. The facility will serve as a unifying building for Haiti Made, bringing together teams of staff who were previously slightly disjointed into a more centralized location. The new Haiti Made facility boasts new amenities, sustainable solar-powered electricity, and large common areas and open air spaces for our staff as well.

With the new facility at Taïno Beach, we are excited for the future as we now have the ability and capacity to manufacture more largescale custom product orders and high-quality custom retail goods for our partners. As such, the future of Haiti Made is moving more toward these segments of business. We thank God for all that we have been blessed with at Taïno Beach, and we look forward to the future as we start new and exciting ventures, create new products, and begin new partnerships!

Pictures of our facility at Taïno Beach below!

This year Haiti Made is proud to take part in Fashion Revolution’s Fashion Revolution Week, an annual initiative that marks the anniversary of the Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh on April 24, 2013, where over 1100 lives were lost in the collapse due to unsafe conditions and negligence. Despite this horrendous tragedy, fashion around the world is still manufactured and produced in similar working conditions to those that existed at the Rana Plaza in Bangladesh. Fashion industry workers around the world are still suffering as a result of how fashion is unsustainably manufactured, sourced, and purchased. With these issues of sustainability and working conditions still at the forefront, it’s more important than ever for us all to ask “Where Did My Clothes Come From?” and “Who Made My Clothes?”

For us at Haiti Made the issues of sustainability and working conditions run deep at the heart of what we do and why we do it. Haiti Made was born out of a deep desire to see Haitians and Haitian communities empowered by dignified and sustainable employment as a part of a larger effort to promote economic growth and sustainability in the country. More than half of Haiti’s population currently lives in abject poverty, and the orphan and child slavery crisis in Haiti has in large part been fueled by the lack of employment and very low wages.

With these factors spiraling Haiti into further economic turmoil, job creation has been proven to succeed where perpetual aid measures have failed. Dignified employment and fair wages mean the provision and preservation of family and community which translates to long term stability. By joining the Haiti Made team, each worker is able to make a fair wage and gain the professional skills necessary for career advancement. As a “Circle of Trade” united around quality products, dignified employment, and grounded in a “hand up” rather than a “hand out” philosophy, Haiti Made will continue to empower our employees and continue the fight in delivering economic sustainability to Haiti as a whole.

It’s more important than ever that we all ask “Who Made My Clothes?” and how our spending habits are affecting how they are made. Like Fashion Revolution, Haiti Made believes the more awareness we can bring to the stories behind our clothes/products, the more impact we can have across the fashion industry to raise standards for workers and the environment, all while improving respective communities and countries around the world. Your curiosity, your voice, and your shopping habits are more powerful than you know.

To find out more about Fashion Revolution and the #FashionRevolutionWeek initiative, please visit www.fashionrevolution.org.