Regenerative by Design

Joanne, hello, everyone. You are
listening to the regenerative by

design podcast where we will be
getting to the root of health,

climate, economics and food. I
am your host. Joni quinwell

Moore, join me on this journey
as we explore the stories of

individuals and organizations
who are working to realign our

food system with both human
health and the health of our

planet. Welcome everybody to the
regenerative by design podcast.

I am so thrilled to welcome my
friend, Kate huffstad, CAD today

to the show. Welcome Kate.

Hey, Joanie, I am excited to get
to sit down with you.

Yeah, there's so much to talk
about. And you and I always have

literally no problem finding a
million things to discuss. But

today, I actually would love for
our listeners to get to know you

a little bit better. I've had
the pleasure of getting to know

you over the last couple of
years and spend some great time

in person last year at a
conference, and I just feel like

your story has so much value in
this regenerative by design

process that our listeners who
have followed this series we're

on, we're on season two of
regenerative by design, where

we're really just trying to dig
deep into that design process,

like, how do we design a world
that considers regenerative

thinking to be the core
operating paradigm, And that

requires a different way of
thinking that affects not just,

you know, agriculture or just
food or just fibers or textiles,

but also, like business thinking
and contract contractual

community thinking. It's, it's
just one of those things, and I

know that you you feel that way
deeply, and it's very much

reflected in your business. So
I'm just excited for you to tell

our listeners a little bit about
your history. About your history

and what you do today, and then
we'll dig into that regenerative

story.

I love it. I mean, at the
outset, to like frame what I'm

working on. I believe that
design at its best can inspire

people to see differently, think
differently, and thus act

differently. So at the outset,
whether it's a product design, a

business design, a farm design,
community, city planning,

design, if we do our jobs. Well,
the outcome of this work can

inspire a different world
through people's change

directions, and we can get to
like how in a tactile way. I'm

trying to use design to do that,
and I do it in a few different

mediums. So my design story, you
know, all start back in 2013 I

started apprenticing with a
custom Western hat maker, and I

started learning to become a
hat. Um, I think I can. It's,

it's been wonderful, and I'm
here in my hat shop with you

today. And I think now I'm about
11 years into being a hat maker.

I think I can now call myself a
master Hatter. And so that was

the beginning of like, my design
life in that tactile form, but

at that same time, in 2013 is
when I met my now husband on his

first farm, which was in Bend,
Oregon, and he was farming

organically and biodynamically,
and I had been introduced to

biodynamics years prior, and so
I was really attracted to his

farm, the community that was
attracted to his farm, really

incredible. People were working
there and volunteering there. So

starting in 2013 really like my
life in design, of like a

product designer, maker and
farmer really started in tandem.

So over the past decade, those
are the two areas I've really

focused on. The farm has scaled.
We started on just about three

acres of leased land, and we
were doing, you know, the

classic market gardening, three
farmers markets a week. We at

the highest point of output, had
150 person CSA. Vegetable

Production was our focus, but we
always did a little bit of

wheat, and we scaled that. So
now we manage about 400 acres of

farmland, and we've taken over
and transitioned about 300 of

that acreage from conventional
to organic, regenerative. And in

the midst of all of that, you
know, we live in an arid region

in the West, our farm has
experienced an 80% reduction in

irrigation waters. So you could
be the. Best farmer with all the

regenerative and organic
practices, but if you lose 80%

of your essentially operating
capital as a farm, which is your

water, you have to seriously
rethink your entire model and

redesign so the farm itself is
its own canvas in which this

work in design, you know, is
manifested. But these two

journeys have kind of like now,
crossed over in what has been my

newest venture, which is range
revolution. In essence, range

revolution is a regenerative
leather goods company that seeks

to pull some of the 5 million
cattle hides that are thrown

into the trash each year out of
the trash, getting them back

into the supply chain and
thereby also providing an

additional return to the
regenerative ranchers and the

processors, aiming to make them
more financially resilient in

the process, while also using
these tangible leather products

to reach a demographic of humans
in the fashion sector who live

extremely detached from the
understanding that everything we

wear and consume comes from the
soil, therefore every day, we

participate in agriculture by
getting dressed.

I love that. Yeah, it's like, so
that's full circle. Round. Yeah,

it's so wonderful. And,

you know, it's it, it

makes a lot of sense to me,
especially with your background

in in custom path making like,
you're already thinking through

the lens of like, fiber and
value added products, um, and

you know, when you think about
so many of the things that

happen at the agricultural
level, in ranching and in

farming both, you see all these
value streams that could

generate revenue, and they
don't, because they lack value

chain partners, which, you know,
for those of us who don't work

in this world, it's like the
It's the buildings or the

processes of the people or the
organizations that take a raw

good and turn it into something
that can be used, like leather,

and leather has a complicated
value chain. I mean, there's

just not there. We don't have
the infrastructure that we did

100 years ago for a number of
reasons and and I've really

appreciated the amount of, you
know, time and energy and

innovation, you know, focus that
you and your team and people

that you collaborate with have
put into really trying to

understand and map out that
value chain for leather. And

that's been a big that's a
that's a heavy lift. And

honestly, most of our audience,
they're involved in regen in

some way, shape or form, and
they're, they're familiar with

the complexities the value
chain, but I don't think we go

there enough. Could you let us
know? Like, what does it take to

take a hide is, you know, at a
slaughterhouse? I know that's

not a pretty word, but a
processing facility, um, like,

what does it take to actually
turn that into leather that can

be made into a handbag or a pair
of shoes or jacket, yeah.

So let's start with maybe where
the system is has been, and then

I'll talk about what we've been
building. So a current commodity

leather supply chain, a lot of
hides that make up leather that

you can get on the commodity
market right now, a lot of them

come from places like Brazil or
New Zealand, particularly the

Brazilian ones are a huge focus
right now, because a lot of

those hides come from systems
that lead to deforestation. So

it's a major focus. So say that
pride from Brazil, it might

travel to China for tanning and
manufacturing, and then from

China to Italy to be made into
handbag, and then from Italy to

its distribution center in, say,
Los Angeles or New York or

whatever, you know, in total,
and I ever tried my travel

25,000 miles around the globe
before finished product as a

person's hand? That is the
current globalized commodity

supply chain of leather,
extremely opaque and extremely

opaque, I think, for a reason.
Meanwhile, like as I mentioned,

in the United States, every
year, we have 5 million cattle

hides going to the trash. So
we've lost the systems for

aggregation. We have lost the
tannery partners. We have lost

manufacturing, as we all know,
here in the United States,

hugely. So to begin to do our
work, one, because I'm working

with regenerative ranchers, I
have to have the relationship

with the ranch to understand,
okay, you know, are you

monitoring, what certification,
or what monitoring protocol are

you using, so that we have
relative security, that indeed

what you say you're doing,
you're doing right, actually,

regenerative. So you have to
have that relationship with. The

ranch. You have to have a
relationship with the the

slaughterhouse, abattoir,
whatever you're most comfortable

with. You have to know, or at
least, yeah, they have to be

able to pull those hides off in
a way where you're going to

viable skin at the end of the
process. They also have to be

willing to do the work of the
initial preservation, salting of

the pride to keep it in good
shape,

added work, heavy duty,
industrial stuff. Yeah, this is

a, you know, a raw material rot,
just like anything else. So it

has to be preserved. That
slaughterhouse has to have the

capacity, infrastructure and
willingness to do that, knowing

that you are absolutely going to
provide the off take. Then it's

got to go to either stage one
tannery or, like a vertically

integrated tannery that'll start
with, like the wet blue process,

and then move into a finished
tan. You know, just like

everything else, we've lost so
many tanneries in the United

States, there's very few left.
So we've been working with a

family tannery in Wisconsin, and
they do a vegetable tanning

process, which is the more eco
friendly tanning process. And

then we are just beginning a
relationship with a tannery in

Lyon, Mexico, because what we
really trying to work on is this

ecosystem approach to the west,
or would like to really focus on

the prides in the West. And what
makes the most sense is to

aggregate from these western
states and take everything down

to this tannery in Leon, Mexico
from like, a streamlined

shipping perspective, yeah,
because we I

mean, what people don't
understand often when they don't

work in these industries is that
in order to hit economies of

scale, we have to have
aggregation. And that's how

things used to work. I mean,
community aggregation and

economic aggregation was very,
very common and has become very,

very rare the last 5060, years
and and it's why we've had, you

know, so few corporations
consolidate and take over so

much of our critical
manufacturing, and it's left

everybody else with a lack of
channels to get through and

with. Without aggregation. It's
not financially feasible. So I

love the way that you guys are
thinking about this. I mean,

ever since the first time I
heard the story, I was like, oh

my goodness, this is so, so
fascinating, because that's how

we can compete. I mean, that's
how, that's how things can

actually really get done, and
it's a collaborative systems

level approach.

Well, think about this. We have
a huge focus on creating a more

regenerative meat sector. This
is currently how the meat sector

works for all these regenerative
ranches. When we send our

steers, we raise, you know,
cattle. When we send our steers

to slaughter, only 65% of the
carcass is getting utilized.

That means, wow, 35% of our
asset is going to the trash.

That is a no way regenerative,
right? So, like Queen, we have

to work on the awful fat, the
bones, the hides. I can't solve

all those. So I am focused on
leather. And we have our

partners who are working on,
off, take for awful bones, hot

for fat. Um, I

mean, the tallow movement is
picking up speed. So I feel like

there's innovators out there,
which is great because that's

what it's going to take. You
don't vertical integration is

enchanting from the outside, but
it's like impossible to do. I

mean, if you were to, like,
figure out how to vertically

integrate and turn all of the
things from your cattle that you

raise and have a value chain in
place for every single offtake,

it would be insanity. I don't
even know how you do that. So I

like an ecosystems approach. If
we have an ecosystem we've

talked about, right, an
ecosystem of businesses that I

think brings a diversity that
lends to resilience, I'll tell

you the, you know, the So, the
height aggregation system, it's,

we're, we're doing it right. We
don't let perfect get in the way

of progress. So we are on the
road to what we aim to do, where

it's still vulnerable is there
has been really a couple of

bigger brands whose early on
commitments to these hides drove

a lot of the aggregation efforts
in which we were able to jump

into with others. Yeah, but
those companies, their

commitments have wavered, and
when you know management

changes, or a corporation is
sold to a different holding

company, if those commitments go
away, all of the other

businesses that are a part of
that ecosystem, their

aggregation is then threatened.
So I've been thinking a lot

about that in the last six
months and working on a B to B

supply chain opportunity that
might help other mid sized

businesses like range revolution
get in on this. So we. Can have

more diversity of businesses
accessing the supply chain,

because it's just like anything
else, if we have just a few

businesses supporting this one
drops out and the stool falls

over totally, Yep, yeah, and
that there's

a, I believe that there is a
real need for digitized

aggregation tools to help um
just see things that are risk

and vulnerability, using things
like AI and whatnot like to

rapidly think through scenarios
like, you know, you think about

strength in numbers, and you
lose one critical member. Now,

everyone's back to the drawing
board of like Google and phone

calls and like thinking and
reading articles instead of,

like, having a tool that can
help us find, like, a potential

second, um, you know, second
entity that could fill a role

like that. Yeah, no, so it's um,
those are the things that I've

been working on this year a lot,
um, and how we can have

innovation brokerages that help
bring that together and foster

that conversation and foster,
like, the contractual

relationships that help bring
those together. And so, like,

we're not constantly reinventing
the wheel, like good contracts

make good friends. And so, like,
I've often wondered, like, okay,

there's, you know, this yearning
to do more collaborative,

aggregative stuff. It'd be so
nice if there were frameworks

that already had some great
contractual things in place that

could be templatized and then
replicated and shared. Be like,

okay, cool. You know this, this
aggregate worked really well,

and they used these types of
contracts and to get it done.

Let's like, learn from that, and
let's use that same approach,

instead of everybody reinventing
the wheel every single time.

Yeah, it gets painful and
expensive, and the attorneys

love it, but sorry, attorneys
like startups don't have that

much money. Yeah, so it's good.
So you guys are actively moving

leather through the supply chain
right now.

Is that right? Yes. And in order
to, like, you know, really at

the get go, you know, create
offtake for it. Range revolution

is a direct to consumer brand
selling finished leather goods.

That's one, you know, leg of the
stool is the direct to consumer

brand. We spent the first two
years really heavy in r, d, as

far as you know, getting the
leather to where we needed that

leather to be, and then starting
to work on the design of the

collection. And now it's really
been this last year, brand

building, creating an E commerce
approach, and getting the brand

into people's hands and just
building brand awareness, I

think regenerative biggest
challenge right now, I'll just

speak from like a, you know,
regenerative food systems,

regenerative agriculture
perspective, is marketing right?

I think marketing getting on the
same page with the consumers, a

massive amount of education and
and making the benefits that we

all know and understand tangible
and understood by the consumer

is one of the biggest lifts.
Like, all this, yeah, the

technical supply chain stuff
like, I have no doubt we can

solve that. But like
consistently, what I see as the

biggest gap in all of this is
the marketing, which comes down

to the brands, which comes down
to having companies who are

truly authentic in their support
of this work, and pouring

dollars into that, just pouring
our efforts into the marketing,

yeah, yeah, and

that education piece is such a
big deal. I mean, we learned

this the hard way, at snack to
this that we'd spent years

developing regenerative farmer
connected supply chains for for

the ingredients that had that as
an option, we still had

ingredients in that product line
that had no regenerative supply

chain. So we couldn't be Roc
certified, we couldn't be

regenerified certified, because
those components didn't exist in

regenerative supply chains. And
then we, you know, it under

review, with like, sprouts
market, for example. She's like,

well, you guys aren't even
really regenerative. And I'm

like, would you like us to call
like, the four farmers that are

part of the supply chain and
tell them that right now,

because some of them have been
doing this for longer than

you've been alive, you know,
like, and like, it's it was like

a it was like an earthquake for
me that day, that day that that

buyer told me that changed the
trajectory of everything I'm

doing, yeah, because it was so
representative of the divide of

understanding that is out there
that they think that

regenerative is just simply a
verification, yeah, which

verifications are helpful and
all but regeneration is a

process. It is a shift in
systems, and it just it

literally changed the trajectory
of my professional life. Yeah,

yeah. No, I'm deeply. Price
trading.

Oh, girl, I I can so relate, and
I've sat in so many meetings,

and my heart is with you in
those moments when this is like,

yeah, your purpose and your
passion, and you know the people

who you're working with and the
good work they're doing, and

then somebody who sits in an
office who knows nothing about

this work just sticks that
stagger in you, and you're like,

oh God, the silos are so bad.

It's painful. It's painful. So I
agree with you on the marketing

need and that education need,
yeah, it's a big deal. It's a

big deal. And it can't be just
done by one brand or one

verification. And I mean, the
verifications that are out

there, I they're great people.
They're doing good work. I I'm

personally appointed with most
of them, and I respect and

admire them, but to have a hero
movement like one winner takes

all like, the essence of
regeneration is that it is

distributed, and that it is
community oriented, and that

there is diversity, because it's
going to be it's going to need

diversity to fit the needs of
like a diverse environment and a

diverse market. That buyer's
comment also reflects what I

hope is changing in that

the marketplace has to support
transition, just the financing

and not punish it. And, yeah,
right, and the financing has to

support the transition, and
that, I think, has been a

painful part of being the Spear
of this movement, whether it's

snap, divest range, revolution,
or whatever, when you fear of a

movement, you have to be so
freaking tough, because you're

going to encounter those
movements on The path to people

having a more nuanced
understanding of how we must

support transition,

yeah, yeah. And that's the
thing, it's like, you're like,

Okay, I've spent eight years
trying to champion this

regenerative model, elevating
these underutilized crops that

are essential to bringing
regeneration to scale, to

fruition in when it comes to row
cropping. And I just, and then

they and they were like, and
furthermore, we can't even have

you on the shelf because you
mentioned regen, and you're not

verified, which makes you a
green washer. And I just, that's

when I lost that. I was like,
we're talking about how these

ingredients support regenerative
agriculture. But you know, and I

understand where those buyers
were coming from where they were

trying to set some standards
around quality, but they

actually, in reality, their
policy is punishing early movers

that have been investing in the
building of this movement. And

to me, that was like crazy, and
I know you are dealing with that

in the textile space as well,
because leather cotton, you

know, regenerative cotton, is a
big deal as well, and the lack

of transparency and traceability
through all these supply chains

makes it very difficult to, you
know, have a provenance, intact

story about your sourcing. So I,
you know, it's we, we could

unpack this all day. But you
know, where can people buy your

products? Can they buy a leather
journal right now? Because I've

held and admired these leather
journals for a long time. So

I'm holding a mic one of our
leather journals. This one was

actually made for the Old Salt
cooperative, which is a

regenerative Montana meat
company. It says on it, land is

kin. Oh, that's so cool. Yeah,
all of our products are

available on our website,
rangerevolution.com we are in.

We got our first three kind of
independent boutique placements

this summer. And you know, we're
just going to kind of continue

to seek out independent
retailers to be in people who

know, you know, a sustainability
story, who admire heritage,

lifetime quality goods,

yeah, but you know, like, what
you said in the regenerative it,

I'll just say in the retail
space. Leather is a sticky one,

because animal agriculture
remains a sticky conversation.

And, you know, byproduct from an
animal agriculture model just

continue to be like a sticking
point in a world that for the

last decade, sustainability and
textiles, ironically, has

equaled biosynthetic materials
that are made of petroleum. And

it has been one of those moments
where I'm sitting in the

meetings and we're talking about
sustainability and textiles, and

they're showing me these all,
you know, vegan materials. And

then when I ask what this
compound name actually means?

Oh, it's a petrochemical
derivative. You know, you learn

that at this point in our fiber
supply chain, 70% of the fibers

in our clothing are petroleum.
Based. It's 70% it's the

magnitude of what we've lost,
the magnitude of how plastic has

been so woven into our lives. We
don't see it because it is

turned into beautiful textile.

Yeah. I mean, I'm sure that
there's some of it woven into

this sweatshirt I'm wearing. I
mean, I got it at the thrift

store. I have no idea where it
came from. And, you know, it's

like, it's everywhere, but what?
Where's this gonna go when it

ends up in a dumpster somewhere,
someday, like that, won't

biodegrade? Like, it's no to me
that we're giving preferential

treatment for sustainability to
things made out of plastic.

And again, like I kind of hate
but I keep coming back here, but

it's marketing, right? The
plastic three has been fantastic

in their market, so we get as
fantastic in our marketing, and

it does start with education. It
starts with nuanced

conversation. And it really like
in supporting the transition, we

cannot let a quest for
perfection stop us in our

progress. This is a long time
coming of like losing these

supply chains that support the
farmers, losing our

understanding of how important
provenance is, it's going to

take time and a lot of effort to
rekindle those connections and

help people see with a holistic
lens again, how our everyday

choices and how we clothe
ourselves, how we eat, how it

creates the world that we live
in? And that's to try and come

back to your thesis in this
podcast. How might design and

the products or the businesses
that we design help people to

see differently, thus think
differently, thus differently.

It's, it's everything I return
to, yeah, yeah. I

love that, um, because it is.
It's once we get the design

shifted, the design imperative,
then suddenly change starts to

have a ripple effect. And it's
like starts to create more and

more regeneration, but without
that marketing effort, like a

like a broader collaborative and
there's some really fantastic

examples of people who have come
into champion that group think,

like AC like Anthony corsero,
like, where he's like, let's get

regen brands together. Let's
evangelize for regen brands.

Let's tell their stories. Let's
create a group momentum which is

so critical and so needed. And
cheers to you. AC. But we need

more. We need more of that. And
we need those people to be more

capitalized and activated and
have more resources so we can

really put it on the map,
because there's still a huge

disconnect in the public. Most
people don't know what

regenerative is, and if they
were to try to define it, they

try to define it by a
verification binary standard,

which won't ever work for
regeneration. Regeneration, by

nature, is not binary. It's not
checklist driven. It is a

process of continuous
improvement and responsiveness

to nature, and that is a very
different thing. And I think

that's where we've had a lot of
trouble creating boundaries

around a definition.

Nor is it linear. As a land
manager, like right is some of

these meetings, you know, with,
again, sustainability teams at

bigger corporations, they're
expecting to see a trajectory

this line of improvement that
goes straight up. When you look

at our farm, we do EOB
monitoring on our farm and

ranch, which is savory
Institute's ecological outcome

Verification Program, when you
look at the trajectory of the

last five years of data, there's
peaks, some valleys, peaks, so

valleys, peaks. It if you were
to look at the entire trend it

is going on. But you have to
understand, oh, this summer, 80%

of irrigation water was removed
from this field. It went from an

irrigated field to non
irrigated. That's what that

means. Oh, this summer,
monitoring was done July 1,

which was two weeks after, there
was 116 degree stretch for two

weeks, things looked pretty
right. So, like, how do you

account for ecosystem processes
in Right? Like you said, like a

binary model, or a model that
just is like, Oh, can you tell

me what the carbon number is
that you've sequestered.

Yeah. You're like, well, carbon
intensity scoring is dependent

on water, plain and simple.
Yeah, you know, I mean, it's

that's the driver of the system.

And can I tell you an example of
like, when I walk into meetings,

we talk about Regeneration, we
talk about soil health and.

Become this abstracted concept.
When I walk into opportunities

to tell people about our work,
what I often tell them about

first is this incredible soil
temperature probe slide. These

are friends of ours who manage
with ballistic plan grazing

about three hours from us.
They've been doing this for a

very long time. In 2021 they
took soil temperatures on

neighboring fields. One field
they had managed for 11 years

using holistic plan grazing on
that model, the soils had kind

of reached a level of
functionality, and they had

truly become problem soils
again, the other parcel they'd

only managed for about four or
five years, so those soils were

still in process of healing,
still fairly dysfunctional. The

ambient temperature on this day
that they took these soil

temperatures was 116 degrees,
the temperature of the soils

that had only been managed for
five years by them, therefore

still fairly dysfunctional on
the path healing. That soil

temperature sat at 147 degrees.
That other field that had been

managed by them for 11 years,
where truly soil health had been

stored set at 89 degrees. Wow.
That difference between a crop

surviving or not. That is the
difference between humanity

having food to eat or not, like
to me as a just a human being,

heat, wildfire, those are two
extremely tactile experiences

that I think the consumer, the
average person can understand

what that temperature really
feels like. So like, instead of

going into the nuances of, like,
how much water, more water we

can hold in our soils, or, you
know, the quality of the water

in the tributaries, or how much
soil organic matter we've

increased on our property, those
become abstractions to the

average person, but the heat
buffering potential of help

they feel. Yeah, it's, it's
something that anyone of any

literacy level or, like cultural
angle, or whatever you know,

like, you could explain that to

five year olds. You're like,
this is really hot from around

the

world, from around the world,
city or rural, and that would be

meaningful. I think that's
really powerful. Kate, like, the

first time I ever really heard
and saw data sets about this,

you know, pertaining to the soil
temperatures, was Ray Archuleta

and Gabe Brown in two different
presentations like but within a

month of each other, and I was
like, I'd heard it, I'd read

about it, but like, when I saw
their slides, it just struck me

with such an incredibly deep
takeaway. Um, but I have never

really done a lot of pushing on
that from, like, a thinking

about it from a marketing
perspective, which I think is

absolutely critical, because
water carbon, carbon gets all

the attention. It's like, you
know, because it has a

monetizable market, water
scarcity and water infiltration

is a big topic, and people kind
of relate to it. But why aren't

we talking about soil
temperatures? Yeah, I

Yep. I just had a call with
somebody yesterday, and I was

like, this is where it's landed
the most when I'm, you know, in

London at a fashion conference,
and I'm trying to connect with

that fashion person, where
agriculture has just not been a

part of their

urban likely, completely not
part of a humanized ag system in

their mind, you know, like they
don't know the people behind

that. It's different when you
don't have a real like person to

person, humanized relationship,
it's like, that's a

divide, yeah, and it's it is
why, as frustrating as it's been

to enter the fashion sector in
this way, I felt very compelled

that it's an area that needs our
focus. Because I've spent the

past 12 years in in food systems
and and I know how to

communicate to the food
consumer. There's still so much

work to be done in the food
sector, but what I started to

see quite clearly is there's a
giant population of the world

where, if we can't reach them
through the food on their plate.

Style and fashion has a way of
leading cultural narratives that

I think is hugely impactful in
our Zeitgeist. And we are just

at the beginning of where I
think the food movement was, you

know, 20 years ago, as organic
started to really become a part

of the vernacular. Farm to Table
started to become a part of the

vernacular. I think we're just
at the nascent phase in that, in

textiles and in fashion. So like
we were talking about earlier,

God, you have to be so freaking
tough and really rooted in

purpose to be at the tip of the
spear of something. Um, and you

have to be flexible to
understand, you know, what your

ultimate mission is, and perhaps
how you think you're going to

accomplish that change. It might
change and look different. It

might become a totally different
iteration than what you thought

would be at the outset. What I
know I need, what I know I need

to do, what I want to do is I
want to create a cultural

conversation which helps the
average fashion consumer think

about how every day they wake up
and they get dressed, they are

voting for the form of
agriculture or support of the

petroleum industry. And how
might we get up and think about

the clothing that we put on or
the bag that we carry with us,

and What world are we voting for

as we do that styling, that's
such a good point. And when you

think about that, just the unit
economics of food and style too,

there's better margins. So I
feel like there's a different

approach to cost of goods sold
in the equations of goods, or

because you're going to use them
time and time again, they're

usually not $2 like, if you're
trying to talk about the, you

know, worth of, like, a pound of
flour, for example, you know,

people, it's they buy it and
they eat it, and it's gone

where, if you're talking about
buying a an item that you're

going to have for a long time,
like a journal, you're going to

have that for a while. You're a
hat, you're going to have that

for a while, maybe a lifetime.
Even it's just, there's a lot of

advantages to innovating and
educating around what

regeneration stands for in that
vertical, because it just is.

The unit economics make it more
approachable, I think, for a

variety of reasons, and also the
permanence gives it a great

place to tell a story. Like, if
you have a code on the inside of

a jacket, I mean that that can
be interpreted and learned from

day after day after day, year
after year, where it's like,

where are you going to put a
coat on a tomato? You know? I

mean, like, so it's like, a
totally different deal. So I

love it. And one of my dearest,
closest friends, who's like a

brother to me. He's a mover,
shaker in the fashion world and

modeling. And I keep telling
him, I'm like, Oh my gosh, and

he's a, he's a country boy from
Oregon, so he gets it. He's a

cowboy. And I'm like, we have,
how do we get, like, the big,

mega fashion industry aligned
with this? Like, you know, next

time you're, you know, in this
group, like, let's, let's create

it, let's make it cool. And
that's the thing is, fashion is

cool, and, you know, the
clothing industry is cool, and

it's a great place to redefine
the narrative of what rural food

and textile production is all
about and make it cool.

That's a totally different
Absolutely, yep, I love it. We

got to make it we got to make it
cool. We got to make it tangible

for people and and fun. This is
something I've been thinking a

lot about, like, our work is
heavy day to day. Our work

systems can be heavy and kind of
depressive, sometimes boring,

right?

But talking about a lot of times
we focus on the like, the bad

stuff that we're battling. But
like, I'm thinking a lot about

from the brand perspective, how
do we infuse this with beauty

and joy? Because honestly, the
average fashion consumer is not

buying based on the altruism of
a sustainability if they're

buying it because it's
beautiful, it's cool, it speaks

to something that is on trend or
has a heritage quality, and if

it is sustainable, that's the
cherry on top at the end of the

purchase decision making
process. So we have to lead by

design. We can't rest on the
altruism of the movement. So in

that sense, it makes the project
very fun for me, because I pull

in my design mind. I like
creating useful, functional,

beautiful things. And then, you
know, it is the Trojan horse by

which I get to do this other
supply chain

work. Yeah, that's a great,
great, great analogy, and I

think it's a fantastic place to
stop this session and give our

audience a little time to
ruminate on all of the things we

talked about today. Kate, thanks
so much for taking the time out

of your busy schedule and and
just, you know, getting this

captured so it can be shared and
learned from and and hopefully

inspire more more designers out
there in the world of

regeneration. So I know people,
I mean, we did mention where

they can find your products and
buy their products. If somebody

wants to reach out to you and
learn, you know, get to know

you. Ask you questions, like,
where's the best place to engage

with you?

So, um, you know, I'm on
LinkedIn, talking about various

business things. You can find me
at cassad, and in that context,

you can follow us on Instagram.
It's at range revolution, and

then also through our website,
rangerevolution.com there is a

contact form we do. Um.
Corporate gifting and white

labeling for other companies who
are looking to gift

regeneratively and to gift
according to their values. And

yeah, I mean, we're always
looking for kind of mission

aligned partners in all of the
ways so you can come find them

wonderful. We'll make sure to
put those in the show notes so

that people can follow your work
and spread the word. And

speaking of that, if you're
still listening, please take a

minute to rate this podcast.
Share it with your friends and

community. Share it on social
media that helps get the word

out and spread the passion for
this regenerative revolution and

range revolution is literally
leading the charge. So thanks so

much, Kate. It's been so fun,
and thank you so much for

listening. This

episode of the regenerative by
design podcast is brought to you

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