Fedora Store and sources

[Jonathan Roberts]

> We are looking to have all of the purchase transactions, printing and
> such handled by a 3rd party.  Fedora does not currently have the means
> to handle maintaining the inventory or purchasing infrastructure.
> This has had us looking at places like cafepress, spreadshirt.com and
> such who do printing on demand to help make sure Fedora Project does
> not end up with money sitting on shelves as inventory.

That's a very reasonable concern :)

> >From the 3rd party print on demand vendors the Store SIG has evaluated
> so far, spreadshirt.com seems to offer the most reasonable solution at
> the moment.  Some of the pros and cons for them are listed here (as
> are some from other vendors we looked at):
>
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/Store/PotentialDistributors
>
> Spreadshirt does offer American Apparel shirts who say they are
> "sweatshop free".  They also offer an organic shirt which is listed
> as:

One concern I'd have is that "sweatshop free" is very different to
somebody receiving a fair wage for their work. But I guess it's a step
in the right direction.

> "Certified by the Control Union World Group, to the Organic Exchange
> 100 guidelines and the SKAL International standards for sustainable
> textile production."

Organic cotton is a significant +. I don't suppose people know about
the issues surrounding growing cotton, but it does account for
approximately 15-20% of the world's pesticide use, some of which makes
it's way into water supplies etc.

> Now, spreadshirt also offers more traditional shirts and are not an
> exclusive Fair Trade shop.  But at least we present a potential Fedora
> store customer with a choice to support fair trade.

I guess my question would be, if we have the option, would we want to
support non-fair trade and manufacturing practices?

>> Is fair trade popular in the US? It's certainly gaining traction here
>> in the UK and I'd be happy to work on this. I already have a few
>> possible connections that I'd be able to explore.
>
> To be honest, I am not sure how popular it is in the US.  My wife
> keeps our family very well aware of it and she does make an effort to
> buy fair trade goods.  Not sure how prevalent it is beyond my
> household though.  :)
>
> If you have something in mind, feel free to outline the details and
> post to the list and update the Potential Distributors page:
>
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/Store/PotentialDistributors

I will see what I can come up with :) I think the print on demand
limit could be a problem though, but I'm at least pleased to see that
spreadshirt.com makes some effort!

Best wishes,

Jon