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“Shun looked upon casting aside the Empire as no more than discarding an old shoe. He would have secretly… fled to the edge of the sea and lived there happily, never giving a thought to the Empire.”
--------Mencius, circa 320 BC
You don’t have to be a Chinese philosophy fan to recognize when it’s time to cast aside the Empire and move on to the next phase of life. We are closing our business after forty years in order to focus on new projects and challenges.
There are numerous reasons for this decision. In Europe, tax and environmental compliance grew steadily more expensive, and Brexit caused ever-tightening Customs and logistical hurdles. Those factors made Europe extremely time consuming and, well, annoying. Additionally, global companies are increasingly downgrading customer support, so that when problems arise, it’s difficult or even impossible to fix them. These factors increase cost and frustration.
On another level, business is dynamic and requires constant reinvention. It’s becoming a world of Tik Tok and Social Media, with the next big buzz, artificial intelligence, just over the horizon. How much new software do we want to learn? How much video do we want to take, edit and post? Besides that, many of our suppliers, people we’ve known for decades, are retiring or dying. In the new landscape of computerized looms and high minimum orders one must work harder and sell more.
If we were twenty years younger, we would embrace these challenges as we always have. The business is still thriving, and we have many wonderful trading partners around the world. But we also recognize that we have a limited amount of time and energy remaining, and have to decide how we want to spend it. It’s easy to put off the things that are the most meaningful and most difficult, whether it’s writing that elusive novel or fighting for the environment. Those are the kinds of things for which we are casting aside this particular empire.
We’ll very much miss the suppliers we’ve befriended, the customers who have enjoyed our products, and working with beautiful textiles and all that they encompass. Thanks to all of you for your support, and we hope you enjoy your Invisible World garments for many years to come.
