Tapestry and Canada Goose increase Covid-19 relief efforts

By

Erin Floyd

Published
Apr 11, 2020

As the world reckons with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, companies like Tapestry Inc. and Canada Goose continue to increase their relief efforts. 

Tapestry, the parent company of Kate Spade, Stuart Weitzman and Coach, first began to provide support during the pandemic by donating $2 million to support small businesses in New York City, the home of all of its brands. Now, the company has announced it will take its support one step further with new contributions from the Coach and Kate Spade New York foundations. 

The Coach Foundation will now commit $200,000 to support Covid-19 frontline assistance charities in the UK, Spain, Italy, France, and Germany chosen by European Tapestry employees. In addition, the foundation will contribute $200,000 to Vogue and the CFDA’s A Common Thread relief fund, and $50,000 to the British Fashion Council Covid-19 response through the Foundation’s Fund at CAF America.

The Kate Spade New York Foundation will donate $100,000 to Crisis Text Line to fund the #Forthefrontlines Initiative, which will provide crisis counseling and emotional support to doctors and nurses working during the crisis. This program will be operational in the U.S., United Kingdom, Ireland and Canada.

The foundation will also distribute $100,000 to ten existing grantees - who will receive $10,000 each - to provide short-term emergency funding for needs including technology needs, virtual programming adaptation, covering missed revenue and emergency needs of each nonprofit, the company said. 

In addition, Tapestry has also launched an initiative to manufacture medical equipment, including disposable parts required for respirators and ventilators, test swabs, and face shields, for healthcare workers by repurposing its existing 3-D printing capabilities in New York. 

In late March, Toronto-based brand Canada Goose announced it would help fight the pandemic by using its manufacturing facilities to produce medical gear for frontline healthcare workers and patients across Canada. 

The brand has now ramped up its domestic production process. On April 9, Canada Goose announced that it will begin to reopen all eight of its Canadian facilities over the next two weeks, with plans to produce at least 60,000 gowns per week with the help of as many as 900 employees.

In total, the brand plans to deliver up to 1.5 million at cost, and any unintentional profits will be donated to national Covid-19 relief funds.