Everlane and Allbirds Earn PETA ‘Pants on Fire’ Awards

For Immediate Release:
February 8, 2021

Contact:
Megan Wiltsie 202-483-7382

“Pants on Fire” awards are on their way from PETA to 10 companies that are guilty of humane washing—that is, trying to deceive customers about their use and abuse of animals—and locally based fashion brands Everlane and Allbirds are among them for claiming to care about animal welfare and the environment even though Everlane sells alpaca fleece and Allbirds sells wool stolen from sheep.

Everlane claims to be “ethical” and “sustainable,” but the Higg Materials Sustainability Index has ranked alpaca fleece—for which workers have been caught tying crying alpacas to a rack and leaving them with bloody wounds from rough shearing—as the second most environmentally damaging material, noting that it’s six times as harmful as polyester and more than four times as damaging as modal, viscose, rayon, lyocell, acrylic, and other vegan materials.

Similarly, Allbirds claims, “Our sheep live the good life”—but PETA and its affiliates have exposed cruelty to sheep the world over, and at the more than 100 large operations that investigators have visited, on even self-described “sustainable” and “responsible” farms, workers beat and stomped on conscious, struggling sheep as well as cut open their skin and slit their throats. The brand also brags about its carbon footprint even though the wool industry is a major producer of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.

“Instead of meeting the skyrocketing demand for vegan fashion that’s kind to animals, brands like Everlane and Allbirds are hiding behind empty welfare policies that do little to stop animal suffering,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “PETA won’t stand by and let them pull the wool—or the alpaca fleece—over concerned customers’ eyes.”

Another recipient of the “Pants on Fire” award is Petaluma-based Clover Sonoma, which brags about treating cows with kindness and respect even though in the dairy industry, these animals are forcibly impregnated, their babies are taken away from them, and they’re sent to slaughter once their bodies wear out.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear”—opposes speciesism, which is a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.