Allbirds
Allbirds is dedicated to making the most sustainable footwear using premium natural materials.
Fast Facts
- Merino wool is ZQ-certified, which means it meets stringent standards of sustainable farming and animal welfare.
- Merino wool requires 60% less energy to produce than typical synthetic materials used in shoes
- Patent pending shipping shoebox uses 40% less materials than traditional shoe packaging.
Introduction
Growing up in New Zealand, Tim Brown couldn’t help but notice all the amazing qualities of merino wool. In fact, it made him wonder why such an incredible, sustainable resource had never been used in footwear before. This simple question became the beginning of an incredible journey to make a revolutionary textile that would, hopefully, create a whole new category of shoes inspired by natural materials. After years of researching, testing, Kickstarting, and chasing his vision, Tim teamed up with Joey Zwillinger, a San Francisco based engineer and renewables expert. Together, they partnered with one of the world’s great Italian textile mills to create an innovative wool fabric made specifically for footwear and successfully designed the most comfortable shoe imaginable. Allbirds and it's supply chain has now become the number one direct-to-consumer brand in the footwear space.
The Problem
Allbirds is arguably one of the fastest-growing direct-to-consumer brands today. Creating a global high touch supply chain is complex. As Allbirds continued to expand globally, they knew that managing fulfillment across different facilities would be a major undertaking. Grouping together multiple facilities is hard, all with their own SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures), software, and onboarding teams. Allbirds needed a way to add warehouses to scale and the ability to manage automated fulfillment business rules for carriers and SLAs. This all takes time and resources away from the #1 goal, growth of the brand.