Pioneers Podcast by Lyreco
The podcast from Lyreco that explores the Future of Work, from Lyreco's innovation team.
Each episode we talk to a pioneer of the future of work, exploring the themes and trends that will shape the workplaces of tomorrow.
Pioneers Podcast by Lyreco
Pockets with Purpose: Fristads and The Apple Approach to Workwear
Lena Bay Højland, Product Director at Fristads, reveals how the Swedish workwear company has evolved over its 100-year history while maintaining a commitment to quality and sustainability. She shares insights into how workwear quality has expanded beyond mere durability to include functionality, comfort, and thoughtful design.
• Quality in workwear has evolved from focusing solely on durability to incorporating functionality, comfort, and design
• Fristads practices 100% user-driven product development, involving end users at every stage of creation
• Sustainability has been in the company's DNA for 100 years, starting with their focus on durability and longevity
• Women's workwear faces challenges with limited options and low sales (15%), creating a difficult cycle to break
• Counterintuitively, organic cotton can have a lower CO2 emission than recycled polyester because cotton absorbs CO2 while growing
• Future innovations will focus on textile-to-textile recycling, more sustainable production methods, and modular design approaches
Visit us at the Future of Work event in Brussels on June 5th to see Fristads' latest sustainable workwear innovations and learn more about their closed-loop production processes.
https://www.fristads.com/
Welcome to the Pioneers podcast by Lyreco. I'm Marc Curtis. Each edition we're talking to pioneers in their own fields. We're talking to business leaders, entrepreneurs, thought leaders, keynote speakers basically anybody who's got something interesting to say about the workplace and is pioneering the way we think about the future of work. Today's conversation was with Nina Bay Højland, who is the product director, product development director, for Fristads, which is a fascinating company from Sweden who have been for the last hundred years specializing in workwear and specifically looking at sustainability, circularity and various other topics which we delve into in a lot more detail during the conversation. I won't say too much about her now because she gives a really good introduction about herself and the company. So, without further ado, let's listen to my conversation with Lina from Fridsats.
Marc Curtis:Welcome to the Pioneers podcast, Lena Bay . Really nice to see you again. Lena is the product director for freestats, which is a swedish workwear company. That doesn't really tell the whole story of what the company is. I think if you're in sweden, germany, the netherlands or or um denmark or belgium, you will definitely have heard of them, especially if you're if you're Sweden, germany, the Netherlands or Denmark or Belgium, you will definitely have heard of them, especially if you're wearing workwear, but it would be great to hear a little bit more about that. But firstly, thank you very much for taking the time today, lina. Really good to see you again. Thank you, nice to be here, perfect. I think it's really interesting to start just by understanding your journey to joining Freesat. You've been with the company for about seven years, but I find it's always really interesting to understand why people work for companies for a long period of time, what attracted them in the first place and where you've come from in your own sort of background and passions and beliefs.
Lena Bay Højland:My background is workwear. It's as simple as it is. I've been working in workwear industry for over 20 years now and for the past seven years, as I mentioned, it's within freestess company. And what attracts me with freestess and why am I still here after seven years is actually the feeling of working first day. You know, it's like every day is a new day. It's a very dynamic company. We've been growing a lot for the past seven years and I think that, yeah, this is the feeling like having a new job every day, all these challenges which are coming and the flexibility, the way we are adapting these challenges and the way we react as a team, and that what makes me, yeah, stay and ask for more so I mean 20 years in in work.
Marc Curtis:I mean that's, that's a career right there. So what, what? What have you seen? What are the biggest changes that you've seen in that sector?
Lena Bay Højland:Well, the biggest change I've seen in the sector is what we put in the meaning of quality of workwear. You know, I would believe for 20 years ago the quality of workwear was about the durability point, I mean, and durability mainly was connected to the strengths of the fabrics we have been using. Durability mainly was connected to the strengths of the fabrics we have been using and with time, within these two last decades I think we evolved pretty much. Quality of workwear today is not only durability, I mean. I think that durability is more like a given feature and quality turned to become more like functionality, comfort. We are striving to use now lighter, more comfortable fabrics and still durable, rather than heavy-duty, rough-and-tough fabrics we used for 20 years ago.
Lena Bay Højland:It's about featuring the workwear with the right pockets. It's about featuring the workwear with the right pockets. It's been a huge thing and there's been a lot of different exciting developments from different suppliers in the industry when it comes to featuring workwear. When you meet the workwear end users, they would say. Some of them would say things like my work pant is my most important tool. I mean you, really, it is the quality. It was identified as the high quality workwear. If the featuring the pockets, fitting the tools and everything works ergonomically correct, et cetera, so that that creates this quality parameter.
Lena Bay Højland:Then it's about the design. Interesting trend with the design is that we've went from a very simple look to a more advanced fashion look, I would say. In the same time, it's very important when you design a workwear that you don't lose the DNA of work well, because it's still to deliver a corporate identity, if you understand what I mean. So it's very important you don't over-design. But lately for the past I'd say three to four years the trend is also going for more, like less is more. I mean, how much can we over pollute the planet with all these huge collections with different color combination, extra products etc. I mean you have to really think about what is necessary. We are not in fashion. We're still not fashion. I mean I'm not saying workwear should stop its design development path. We should continue on that, definitely.
Lena Bay Højland:But we also need to think a little bit differently. What is it that we need to deliver? Do we really need all these collections? Because it's all about the overproduction and overperformance on the parameters, which actually has quite a toll on the planet. So you need to. You know it's a balance and we need to face it and it's a little bit difficult because you know it's a balance and we need to face it. And it's a little bit difficult because you know fashion and good looking clothes is always a competition parameter. So you're trying your best. We are at Freestess. We have been for some years already looking for some different solutions, which I hope to talk about during the arrangement we have in June. So a little cliffhanger for the future. But it's yeah, we need to think differently and that's the yeah. That's mainly the message, what I wanted to say.
Marc Curtis:I'm quite. I mean, there's a lot in there and it's there's some really interesting parallels for me. So I'm quite interested in the way that the sector is moving more towards clothes that people want to be seen in, I guess. So people obviously have a stake in, or workers have a stake in, wearing workwear or demanding workwear that looks good on them, rather than just something that is just going to protect them or is durable in the workplace. So I'm quite interested in that and I think it's quite interesting that there's a parallel there with the workplace itself, in that the workplace is sort of taking cues from the consumer world as well and making workplaces feel more like homes rather than offices. So I wonder whether or not there's a correlation there.
Marc Curtis:But I'm also quite interested in this. You know how it sits alongside or compares to the fashion world, because there's a lot of stuff in the media about fast fashion and about the huge overconsumption that happens in the high street brands, and presumably you're not untouched by that kind of those kind of subjects. But but what approach do you have? Which is? Which is different, would you say, from, from from consumer brands?
Lena Bay Højland:well, that's, that's. That's the thing there's, thinking a little bit differently. Less is more, I think, of what they really need to have. Just keep on on the must-have level, try not to over compete on that. You know, now we have 10 colors in our collection and maybe two of them are selling and the other ones we just have because we have a wide assortment and we would like to, you know, expand. You know that we need to go away from that in a way.
Lena Bay Højland:On the other hand, as I said, it's a very thin line because you don't want to lose the competition parameter, you know, in it. So it's, it's an art, I would say, uh, to create workwear which looks good, does not lose the corporate identity dna, because it still has to look like workwear, because some of the companies would say, well, it's a good looking piece, but I don't really look professional enough in it, so so. So that is, that is one for me. And thirdly, we have some ideas of how can we create different variations of workwear without having as much in stock. So, for instance, to have a modularity, have some detachable parts of the workwear which you can collect, kind of sort of build your own trouser, I mean, it's also one of the things that we are considering, so considering to bring down the production of the units and maintaining the sales in a different way and growing, of course.
Marc Curtis:I mean again really interesting. And especially, I love the fact that there's this spectrum. On the one hand, you've got fashion, where people are literally buying things based on who knows I mean, I'm a, you know, I'm the last person to know about fashion. In reality, I almost wear workwear every day because for me, utility is king and and there's this clearly, this huge spectrum between the two where you've got to kind of position your brand to make sure that it is, you know, serves all the utility functions but still, you know, enables people to look good. I'm I'm also interested, I'm quite curious to know how much influence the users of the workwear have on, um, the decisions that your customers are making to buy, or or even the design, uh, decisions that you're making. It is is, are you ever in ever in contact directly with the users of your workwear, or does it tend to be through the buyers, or what does that look like?
Lena Bay Højland:100%, user-driven 100%. So if you ask me, who decides? It's the end user, definitely. I always joke about the product development team of FreeSys. We are so lazy that we hired, actually, the end users to develop their own work. We can't do it without them and it's actually quite serious statement. Of course we do the work, but they are the ones who are our number one inspiration. Number two they are the ones who are testing the ideas together with us and we always look for very critical end users.
Lena Bay Højland:When I come to a working place where I'm looking or fishing for end users to help us in development project, I'm looking for the most critical one, always the one who always has something to say. It's very important, has something to say. It's very important. I know these people. They have a lot of input about the work, how it works today, what they're not happy with, what they're happy with as well. It's also very important to know, and once we start making the new gear, they also give us the ideas for new features. Sometimes it helps just to observe them working. You know, sometimes they don't say anything, but if we are there and we are just watching them work and then we spend the day with them, then we can get a lot of ideas.
Lena Bay Højland:So it's 100% user-driven, from the inspiration, from the idea stage to the finished garment. And we have a lot of different stages in testing First prototypes, first ideas, then the updated ideas, then we change to another group of end users who is testing the ideas of the first group of users. So really we're driving it very dynamic. We are often practicing the focus groups. That's also an interesting part of our work. So, yes, I'd say who is the Freestess development group? That's end users. Yes, I'd say who is the Freestess development group? That's end users. We're just helping them to create the product which speaks their language, because the product has to speak the language of the end user. It has to be so easy. You wear it, you recognize this feature, you start using it right away. I always admire the Apple product in that case. When you buy a computer and you need to, when you install and all that, it's always so difficult. Just give an iPad to a three-year-old.
Marc Curtis:So what you're saying is that the free set is the is the Apple of the work wear.
Lena Bay Højland:I would say I would say so, yes, that's that's. That's what our mission is. We're striving for, really, like you know. So the end user just wears and said yo. So the end user just wears it and says, yeah, I know what this pocket is for. I don't need to put a tag, use this pocket for that or this. Of course we're making pictures, we have marketing material. I wouldn't say that it's so easy or simple or anything, but the ultimate goal is that when they wear it, they know it.
Marc Curtis:That's really interesting, genuinely interesting I'd like to get on to in a minute about the sustainability part of the business and some of the other topics that I know that your company is very interested in. But I'm actually a little bit interested as well to understand. You talk about the DNA of the product. What's the DNA of the company? What does the company believe? What's their mission, um, and how has that evolved and and maybe changed over the years, or has it always been quite consistent?
Lena Bay Højland:dna of freestess is quality and sustainability. I mean, we are 100 years old, the brand is 100 years old, and the first slogan of freestess was that double durability, double quality for half price. I mean, it's been like in our DNA. We've been working with quality and durability for 100 years and a lot of brands are asking me when did you start your sustainability journey? And I said, well, when we were born. It's just that sustainability back then was about the durability and performance, etc.
Lena Bay Højland:Today, our business idea is sustainable workwear solutions for professionals. We believe that every professional should be dressed for sustainable performance and that's what we are doing. And now, these days, we of course have a lot of innovations within the sustainability. These days, we of course have a lot of innovations within the sustainability. So we evolved as the quality of workwear evolved from durable fabrics you know, heavy duty, simple to advanced level, as it is today. The sustainability journey of workwear has been also evolving for the past hundred years and starting from the durable fabrics double durability, double quality for half price and today it's about using more sustainable materials, more sustainable way of production, more sustainable way of driving and managing the assortment as I mentioned before, less is more and other aspects. So we strive to be the leader of sustainability in the industry and we want to set the standards and don't follow them.
Marc Curtis:And on that topic I mean is that? Because I think my experience and I'm not an expert, obviously, in workwear and safety wear but it seems to me that that's almost like the forgotten category when it comes to sustainability. There's a lot of single use stuff in the safety world. You know gloves and hard hats and masks and so forth, and I know that's tangential to the workwear area, but but I think safety sometimes feels like that. The sustainability conversations has happened quite late, clearly, with you guys. It's been there from the beginning. But what do you see in the wider market? Do you still see that the companies are now answering that challenge? Or are there a lot of actors in the in the category that are really not focusing on the sustainability piece and focusing on keeping cost base low and that kind of stuff?
Lena Bay Højland:I think everyone is focused on sustainability these days. I don't remember when there was the last time I met the company where the sustainability was not highest on their agenda, whether it's a supplier, sub-supplier, contractor, sub-contractor, customer. I think it came to stay and it's high on the agenda of most of the companies. So I don't know anymore the companies who don't work with sustainability. Let me put it like this Now, when that said, I'm not working with everyone and everything.
Lena Bay Højland:Of course, there are probably still some industries where it's most cost-driven, but sustainability's cost is one of the obstacles or challenges we have met from the beginning of our journey. I remember when I started for seven years ago and we started this work on environmental product declarations and all the other activities we have made and actions we've made since then. We have been facing the cost issues very often. More sustainable material costs more, more sustainable production costs more. So it is also a part of that journey to overcome this obstacle and to secure that we deliver sustainability for the same cost as conventional material.
Lena Bay Højland:It is very important, because we believe in free system, that our customers should not pay extra for sustainability. It has to become a part of us and I would imagine that there's still some industry somewhere where they are so much cost-driven that they simply cannot afford it, and if you understand what I mean. So so for them is a little bit more difficult than it was for us. Not that I'm saying that ours was easy definitely not, and I still see it and it is. It is what it is. And, uh, we have an extra cost, we have a certain budget for sustainability activities, so that's given, but we still try to keep the competitiveness of the price level on our products. So when it comes to the end user who is buying more sustainable products, he's supposed to buy it at market price and not overpriced, because it's more sustainable.
Marc Curtis:Do you think that that's partly driven from a cultural perspective because your company is a Swedish company? The Nordics are classically always people always point to them and say that that's where a lot of these initiatives actually originate, and awareness of our impact on the environment and the value of biodiversity and nature is sort of inbuilt into the Nordic countries. Do you think that's part of the reason why you're doing it?
Lena Bay Højland:Yes, partly this, but also the legislation you can see. If you look on the market, you see the leaders in sustainability I mean, the ones who are among the leading sustainable countries is Benelux and France and if you see the development of the legislation when it comes to the sustainability, they are in a fourth road. So I think legislation is one of the strongest arguments I would put on the table when it comes to sustainability. And then, yes, the Nordic heritage is what, of course, is in our blood. We are in a force for all these kind of innovations. And, yeah, that is why, if you look, for instance, into ecotex you probably have heard of ecotex no, I haven't.
Marc Curtis:Please tell me.
Lena Bay Højland:It's about the restriction of chemical, of certain chemical use, oh, like DFA and so forth in Texas.
Lena Bay Højland:Yes, yeah, pfs among that, but more than that. So it's all these dangerous chemicals. So Ecotex was also. It's a product which is like about 30 years old probably, and this is where Freestess, for instance, was one of the first brands who adopted it back then and wanted to have your critics on most of our materials. And then on the Reddit comments it says we've been working with that also for a very, very long time. And then, yeah, I think it has something to do with the Nordic heritage, but I would say that legislation plays a significant role, definitely in this development.
Marc Curtis:And is there any? I mean innovation, I think, is a really big part of every company's sustainability journey, especially if you're a company that designs and makes products. It's very different, obviously, if you're a company that's reselling, but I think if you're doing product development, then innovation is really crucial. Is there anything from a materials perspective or material sciences perspective that that that you're particularly interested in, that you think is is going to be the next, the next big change? Is there anything coming down the line that that could potentially have an impact on on how we think about circularity and work with?
Lena Bay Højland:Definitely the more use of more sustainable raw materials, and I believe there will be a trend in the future where we will migrate from using the recycled polyester made from plastic bottles to textile, to textile recycled polyester. I believe that there's going to be a trend in that direction In general. I believe also that a lot of big players in textile industry will start demanding from their suppliers to use more sustainable sources of energy when they're producing, especially when they're producing the fabrics. We know it today because we measure the sustainable sorry, the environmental impact of a lot of our products from we start growing the cotton till the ready garment is in stock. We know where the figures are highest, where the emission is highest, and it is in the production of the fabric. So we know what to demand.
Marc Curtis:We have so much data today and not only Freestess but the industry in general we should be able to start demanding it more and more and I think there will be a trend where the big players, as I said, will start demanding it and we will start seeing less emission in textile production once that is established and a little bit more of a focus on on regenerative farming as well and biodiversity sort of first um, because because this is one of the big challenges with cotton, right, even organic or or, um, you know, fair trade cotton still has a, you know, still has an impact, and I think we were at the beginning of seeing this kind of wave of regenerative kind of products being built.
Lena Bay Højland:But well, yes, yes, no, it depends. Recently, actually quite recently, I found out that recycled polyester has a higher CO2 emission than the organic cotton, for instance. I thought, yeah, I actually, and I must admit it, you know, here it is, you live and you learn. I thought in my perception, that cotton is not really a sustainable fiber. And, of course, yes, there are more sustainable versions, like Tencel, for instance, et cetera, and a lot of textile producers are using alternatives for cotton because it's perceived to be not sustainable.
Lena Bay Højland:But if you compare it to the polyester and you really do the measurement, you could be surprised that the cotton delivers a better CO2 emission I mean lower CO2 emission than recycled polyester. And why is that? Because when cotton is growing, it's also absorbing the CO2. So it's what absorbing the CO2.? So it's, you know, it's what is taking in Exactly, so it neutralizes, it takes in in the production process and what it uses. It's not one-to-one and, yes, you need to make a measurement, but it is. That was quite a new thing for me to learn. Actually, I recently learned it when we started, when we were looking exactly in comparisons of cotton with other fibers. And, uh, my question to the fabric engineer was I would like to see the data on recycled polyester, and then they explained to me why is it that organic cotton actually has a lower co2 emission? Water is another thing use more water but yeah, but yeah.
Lena Bay Højland:So it is, of course, a balance, but it's interesting. It's an amazing world to enter. You get so much new information and it's a new universe. I feel like we are standing in the era of internet starts, because there's so many different startups opening up here and there, so many good ideas coming up and you learn so many new things. I think it's exciting.
Lena Bay Højland:My dream is that the end user will also understand it. It's more like you can compare it to calories. When we buy a chocolate bar, we all know this has so and so many calories and this one has less calories. Okay, I'm on a diet, I take this one. Uh, we don't do it on co2 and water. I mean, it would be so cool if all the work you know not work, but all textiles, every product, would have this kind of attack, a calorie tag you know, on co2, so people can actually relate to this data and can compare. That requires that we all measure equally and there is the same standard we follow. Otherwise it will never be comparable. So it's a huge way to go there.
Marc Curtis:I know, I absolutely agree. I think it's absolutely fascinating and I think you're right. My feeling is we are sort of at the beginning of that journey where people are looking at labels, especially in food, and trying to understand you know where that, where things come from and what the impact on the environment is. And and to your point as well, lena, on the difference between organic cotton and recycled polyester quite often the answers are very counterintuitive. You don't realize, you know, you think you're making the right choices, um, and yet actually when you look at the data, even if it's an uncomfortable truth or something you don't necessarily want to hear, actually, if you're led by the science on these things, you can actually make real differences. And I think the big challenge for us and for manufacturers like you is how do we tell that story to our consumers in a way that they can make informed decisions when they're making purchasing decisions, just sort of moving slightly away from sustainability.
Marc Curtis:Another topic that I'm very interested in and it was actually a big topic for us a couple of years ago in one of our Lyrico Pioneer entrepreneurship programs was the disproportionate I'm trying to find the right way of saying it the disproportionate focus on um male body types in workwear and and what I mean by that? Obviously you know what I mean by that, but what I mean is that quite often workwear is designed with men in mind, um, and then so-called unisex fitted versions are produced and actually all they are is the male sizes or the male designs, but just scaled down a little bit, which of course, doesn't account for the different body shapes and types of women and also account for, especially with women, the requirement to have different fabric types at different times in their life or to accommodate different needs and requirements. I was wondering if you have any thoughts on the role of bristats in gender-specific workwear and, just generally, is this a topic that we should be leaning into a little bit more?
Lena Bay Højland:Definitely Highest on the agenda. I don't understand why should it be like this that we have such a huge assortment, for men and women cannot choose the same variety, the same assortment of workwear as men. And well, it's not a secret in our business. When we look into the sales of the women's workwear, it is very low. And I often ask myself this question. I often ask this question to the end users why, why is it like this? Well, for starters, I think women, they just get used to it. Well, that's what I always have been buying. Sometimes they actually do prefer to buy a man's size. Sometimes it's a decision of the purchase.
Lena Bay Højland:I don't want to have all these SKUs in my purchase. I don't want to have all these SKUs in my stock. I don't want to have as many styles, I want to have a smaller assortment. It's all these parameters that play, so we need to change that. And then it's actually also a huge issue with the overproduction and over-emissioning, because need if you want to have this woman style same as a men's style and you only send 10% of what you normally sell, so 90% of sales approximately and I meant maybe it's 85, but it's not more than that. This is sorry, it's not less so.
Lena Bay Højland:85% is what we sell on the men's style and then we have 15 percent on the woman. So this 15 percent of sales is is it's very low. It means that you need to have a stock and workwear has to be in stock. You cannot order it and wait for for four months or longer. You need to have it because your people starting up they need to have a workwear.
Lena Bay Højland:So you need to maintain a certain level of the stock and it's very difficult to maintain it with a low sales, really, because sometimes you're missing one size, then you need to buy and then all of a sudden you have a stock for 10 years again and it's you know it's really difficult. So for us and for the industry, we need to solve this. We need to find a good idea of how to, how to make it, how to steer this kind of assortment development to make sure that we have more women styles and that we don't overproduce. That's that's a big balance for us and that's an issue for us to solve but it's a chicken and an egg situation, isn't it?
Marc Curtis:and I think I think that we discovered this with the project that we ran on on workwear for women a couple of years ago that in some respects, it's not. That, manufacturers you know, is there a reason? You know why. Why should we, why should we have well-fitting work, where, you know, seems to be misunderstood as well. And and also, frankly, you know, and I don't know whether this is controversial, it's probably. I don't think it is, I think it's probably just true I think most buyers tend to be men, um, and they're probably not, they're probably not thinking necessarily about you know, anything beyond their own personal experience. I don't know whether that's, whether that's doing them a disservice, but, but it seems that a lot of what we can do is is more around education and and awareness rather than, you know, specifically changing our manufacturing processes. But, to your point, you can't do that until you've got the demand behind it, I suppose.
Lena Bay Højland:I agree with you. So it's a communication, Of course the communication, then we have it. Why do we need it? Why is it different, et cetera. It's very, very important.
Marc Curtis:I feel like, well, we've been chatting, doesn't feel that long, but we've actually been talking for about 35 minutes now. So I'm very aware of the fact that I need to wrap things up, but, I think, two questions. I normally like to finish and I'll give you a bit of time to think about it. I normally like to finish by asking our podcast guests who inspires you or who are your heroes in either your own life or in your professional life, but that's something you can keep, maybe, at the back of your head, um, but it would be really interesting to know, um, and I know that you're going to be showing off some new products at the future of work conference in brussels on june the 5th but what? What should we be looking at for the future? What's the next big and not just for free sets, but what's the next big um trend or innovation or topic that we need to be paying attention to? Or or is it really just a continuation and a building on what we're already working on?
Lena Bay Højland:Building on sustainability, new developments, innovations within sustainability. I think there will be, of course, upcoming new product types, different protection levels and things like that. Workwear will continue evolving in that direction. That is given. For me, the most exciting part of all this upcoming time is what innovations will come in sustainability, on the sustainability area. So for sure, either it will be a new raw material maybe not textile to textile, recycled polyester, maybe something else or again, new production technique or new technique in circularity. It's still a very new area. I'd say there's not so many possibilities yet, but there is a huge demand in recycling.
Marc Curtis:Does FreeSats work with the startup world? Are you connecting with the entrepreneurs and the smaller companies who are doing some of this stuff?
Lena Bay Højland:Yes, we do, and we have the closed loop process where we are collecting our used workwear from some end users and then making it into a new workwear so that we have. But we also are working. I mean, textile industry is big. The planet is big. There is a lot of textile waste all over the planet. So we're also working in other places where we have our fabric suppliers, where we're collecting the waste pre-consumer like in production waste and post-consumer waste and then turning it into the new fabric, so using it as a raw material.
Marc Curtis:As a result, brilliant. So that last question then, having given you minutes to think about it who do you admire, either in your industry or you know? I get the sense that you're very driven by sustainability anyway, so I'd be interested to know who you're following.
Lena Bay Højland:It's interesting because the two ones I you know, which pops up in my mind that I really admire and know a lot about is Henry Ford and Steve Jobs. They're not, and it's… For different reasons. Yeah, there are other reasons. Steve Jobs, it's a character, it's a passion, you know, and the way he lived and the way he developed and the innovation that he brought.
Lena Bay Højland:Definitely I admire him on so many levels uh, entrepreneurship, um, dedication, passion, uh, he's a great presenter. You know, all these things that I do really look up to a lot. And, uh, henry ford and his career was also very interesting, uh, in terms he inspired me was once he said that I don't remember exactly his words, but it was something like if you want to, uh, if you ask people what they want, they would say faster horses and that like, is it that you, of course, you need to always involve the end users in the product development, all that but you need to bring something they don't know they want, and finding this is the key for product developers. So, yeah, I guess these two persons, but probably, if I think more, I would find more.
Marc Curtis:No, I think that's really revealing and I think, coming from, as you do, a product development perspective, you're absolutely right, of course, and Steve Jobs is a great example of that as well. I mean, I have specific memories of when they introduced the first ipads and everybody was walking around going nobody wants this.
Marc Curtis:you know what you want a giant phone that you can't make phone calls or come on, and then you know within six months. Of course, you know, we, we, we understood that they've created an entirely uh, an entirely new market. And nina, one more thing, actually One of our speakers, we've got a speaker who's closing off the day at the Future of Work event. His name is Peter Hinsens and he owns and this is why you should, because obviously you're coming and you should absolutely meet him he has the biggest collection apparently in the world of Apple products, from the very first, from the first iPhone, no, no, no from the first computer that Dalton Yacken see, so from the Lisa 1, I think, the computer. And he bought a chapel in Belgium just to house his collection of Apple products. So he's got.
Lena Bay Højland:Oh, my God.
Marc Curtis:And apparently it's the largest collection of Apple products from the whole of history in the world. So he calls it his apple chapel. Um, but that's a start. Oh, happy couple. So I'll make, I'll make sure you get to speak to um. Lena. Thank you so much for taking the time. Um, I really really appreciate you talking about it and it is genuinely an interesting subject and one that I think you know really doesn't get enough attention.
Marc Curtis:I think workwear is is something that almost everybody has had some kind of contact with. You know, we've all worn uniforms, we've all. You know, we all put on clothes to do specific jobs and I think you know it's not often we think about what happens before and what happens after the to those fabrics and and, and you know the thought that goes into it. And and you know, I think there's a whole conversation we could have just on pockets, because I know that's such a big issue for sets. But maybe we'll talk about that on June the 5th. So for now, thank you so much for taking the time and really looking forward to seeing you in June.
Lena Bay Højland:Thank you, marc, see you Thank you.
Marc Curtis:That was Lena. Really interesting conversation again. I'm honestly, I really feel quite blessed at the moment that I'm having these incredible conversations with, uh, either speakers for the event or suppliers who are supporting us. It's it's really expanding my knowledge and almost every time I have one of these conversations I'm finding out something new or getting a new perspective on on some really really diverse subjects. I I think that for me, what's really interesting there is just how different the, the b2b and the consumer fashion world is. Uh, as I say, it's not even a joke, really. I think I'd be quite happy to wear workwear almost every day. It certainly serves much more of a utilitarian process, but then that's just me, I think. Um, anybody who knows me knows that, uh, my clothing choices are not necessarily based on fashion. They're they're often based on number of pockets, um, so that's it for this podcast today.
Marc Curtis:As I said, um, we will be seeing FreedStats and finding out a lot more about their products and some of their new innovations at the Future of Work event in Brussels on June the 5th. Have a look at the link in the podcast notes if you want to find out a little bit more and if you're a Lyreco customer, contact your salesperson or contact at Lyreco and they will sort you out with a free ticket for the event. But otherwise, really excited to see people there. It's going to be amazing. Come along, see what we've got to offer. Find out more about all of these amazing companies that we're talking to at the moment. See you soon.
