KEEN, Inc. Fulfills its Mission of Pairing Values and Creativity With New Line of Upcycled Bags

PORTLAND, Ore. (April 18, 2018)—KEEN, Inc. (KEEN), a values-led, family-owned outdoor and lifestyle footwear brand known for its original and versatile products, partners with Nossa Familia Coffee to release the KEEN Harvest Collection, a brand-new set of five handbags that keep materials out of landfills. The latest extension of KEEN’s mission to rethink material sourcing with a focus on reusing and repurposing where possible, the Harvest Collection is exclusively available at keenfootwear.com, and at KEEN retail stores in Portland, Oregon, and Palo Alto, California.

“We built the KEEN Harvest Collection on the simple premise of ‘Repurposed for a Purpose,’” says Brian Anthony, KEEN senior business unit manager for softgoods and accessories. “As a values-led company, KEEN frequently looks beyond the typical footwear supply chain, where you build products from virgin materials, to see what else is out there. This year, we partnered with Portland-based coffee roaster Nossa Familia to give their coffee sacks a second life.”

For the threads of fabric, the KEEN Harvest Collection is a third life. Before those threads were woven into coffee sacks and then into KEEN bags, they were fabric waste. The New Denim Project in Guatemala City takes pre-consumer denim waste and post-consumer second-hand clothing waste in Guatemala, and turns it into upcycled fabric that is used to make home textiles, apparel, bags, and packaging, including coffee sacks. This process saves up to 5,284 gallons of water for every kilogram of upcycled material.

Nossa Familia’s direct-trade coffee growers in Guatemala—De La Gente and Finca San Jerónimo Miramar—use the upcycled sacks to export their coffee beans to the United States. De La Gente and Finca San Jerónimo Miramar share KEEN’s values-led approach to business, working with small-holder coffee farmers to improve economic opportunities and focusing on sustainable growing practices, respectively.

“Upcycling is a project that is going to take all of us, all of the time, and that’s the point,” says Arianne Engelberg, creative director of The New Denim Project. “We need every stakeholder in the pre- and post-consumer supply chain to close the loop on these materials. Working with KEEN and Nossa, we are able to create beautiful products that can be reused over and over and over again, while completely rethinking the concept of material waste.”

The KEEN Harvest Coffee Shopper (MSRP $55), Harvest Coffee Dopp Kit (MSRP $45), Harvest Coffee Pen Case (MSRP $40), Harvest Coffee Large Snap Bag (MSRP $35)and Harvest Coffee Small Snap Bag (MSRP $30)are available now at keenfootwear.com.

Visit www.keenfootwear.com/nossa-familia/ for more information about the KEEN Harvest Collection.

Please direct KEEN media inquiries to Account Manager Massimo Alpian at massimo.alpian@rygr.us.

About KEEN: Driven by a passion for life outside, KEEN is a values-led, independently owned brand from Portland, Oregon, that’s on a mission to create original and versatile products, improve lives, and inspire outside adventure. Founded in 2003, it launched a revolution in the footwear industry with the introduction of the Newport adventure sandal, and has donated more than $15 million to non-profit organizations and causes around the world to promote responsible outdoor recreation, including conservation efforts to protect open spaces. KEEN strives to show the world through its products and its actions that a business for good can actually be good for business. By giving back, reducing impact, and activating communities and individuals to protect the places where we work and play, KEEN puts its values in motion and takes action to leave the world a better place. Learn more at https://www.keenfootwear.com/our-purpose.html