Jeansland Podcast

Jeansland
  • 5.0 (12)
  • SOCIETY & CULTURE

This is why I do this. Jeansland is a podcast about the ecosystem in which jeans live. There are an estimated 26 million cotton farmers around the world, and about 25% of their production goes into jeans, which could mean 6.2 million farmers depend on denim. I read estimates that at least 1 million people work in retail selling jeans, and another 1.5 to 2 million sew them. And then there are all the label producers, pattern makers, laundries, chemical companies, machinery producers, and those that work in denim mills. I mean, the jeans industry, which is bigger than the global movie and music business combined, employs a lot of human beings. And many of them, like me, love jeans. The French philosopher and existentialist Simone de Beauvoir, when visiting New York, said, "Everyone in the New York subway is a novel." I never met her, but I guess she made the observation because of the incredible diversity of people who ride the subway system. I'm convinced the people in our jeans industry are like those in the subway. They are unique, with rich and complex stories to tell, and I want to hear them. And deep inside me, I think you might feel the same way. https://jeansland.co/

  1. Ep 61: Building the Denim Finishing Industry with Alice Tonello

    6D AGO

    Ep 61: Building the Denim Finishing Industry with Alice Tonello

    Before there was a denim finishing industry, there was nothing. This week, Andrew sits down with Alice Tonello, Chief Brand & Strategy Officer at Tonello, a second-generation company that helped build that industry from scratch. In 1981, her uncle Osvaldo, a maintenance technician in a dye house, saw brands trying to figure out how to wash jeans and built the first machine to do it. No roadmap. No precedent. Just a need and a solution. From there, the conversation follows the full arc. Stone wash to laser. From early processes to technology that now replaces manual work entirely. From 100 liters of water per garment down to something closer to 20 when the system is done right. They get into what actually drives innovation. Not just machines, but proximity to production, tight feedback loops, and people who understand the process end to end. What “Made in Italy” means when it’s tied to engineering, not marketing. And why staying private changes how you make decisions. There’s also a bigger question running underneath the entire conversation: will the industry ever allow a pair of jeans to be worth what it actually costs to make well? In this episode, we begin to explore that question. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Alice Tonello Chief Brand & Strategy Officer at Tonello Tonello, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    41 min
  2. Ep 60: The Human Side of a Contract

    MAR 18

    Ep 60: The Human Side of a Contract

    In this short, I go back to a moment in the early 90s, sitting across from a senior executive at Calvin Klein who asked me to cancel a fabric order we had already made. I couldn’t. He understood, the goods shipped, and the order was honored as agreed.   Years later, I faced similar situations. Orders were canceled, but there was still a sense of responsibility.  In each case, the customer stepped up and paid for the cost of goods. It wasn’t ideal, but it was fair. And then, something shifted. The same request came again, but this time with a very different tone. What followed was not a negotiation, but a test of leverage, where the outcome carried consequences far beyond a single order.   The business itself didn’t change. The way people handled it did. This is not about one company. It’s about how commitments are treated, how risk moves through the supply chain, and what happens when the meaning of an order starts to erode. At a certain point, it becomes a simple question. What is a contract worth? Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    9 min
  3. Ep 59: Pakistan’s Vertical Denim System with Rizwan Shafi

    MAR 11

    Ep 59: Pakistan’s Vertical Denim System with Rizwan Shafi

    Some businesses are built through planning. Others are built through history, disruption, and decisions made under pressure. In Episode 59, I speak with Rizwan Shafi of Crescent Bahuman, one of the defining names in Pakistan’s denim industry. His family’s story begins in the years after Partition, moves through cotton trading and textile expansion, and eventually leads to one of the first fully vertically integrated denim and garment operations in the region. The company’s model was unusual. Fabric, garment manufacturing, and washing were all brought together in one place. Over time, Crescent Bahuman also became the first authorized manufacturer of Levi’s 501 jeans outside the Americas. We talk about how the company was built, from the original Greenwood joint venture to the difficult years that followed when the company had scale but no market. Rizwan explains what it took to convince customers that Pakistan could produce quality denim and garments, and why Levi’s played an important role in that development. We also discuss why his father chose to build the operation outside a major city, creating a 600-acre campus that includes the factory, housing for thousands of employees, healthcare facilities, daycare, and education. It was an early attempt to build an industrial ecosystem rather than just a factory. From there, the conversation turns to Pakistan’s cotton, ginning, traceability, tariffs, women in the workplace, and the shift from long-term relationships to vendor scorecards and transactional sourcing. Rizwan’s view of the next ten years is direct. Pakistan has the raw materials, the industrial base, and the labor. The question is whether it can build a more connected, transparent, and specialized supply chain around them. This is a conversation about industrial memory, national capacity, and what it takes to keep building when the rules keep changing. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Rizwan Shafi Chief Executive Officer, Crescent Bahuman Crescent Bahuman, LinkedIn, Instagram Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    38 min
  4. Ep 58—FRESH BLOOD, Part 3: A New Generation of Mills with Lucille Ix and Lucas Van de Woestyne

    MAR 4

    Ep 58—FRESH BLOOD, Part 3: A New Generation of Mills with Lucille Ix and Lucas Van de Woestyne

    This is the third installment of our Fresh Blood series. I wanted to hear directly from two young professionals who grew up around textiles and are now working in fabric manufacturing. My guests are Lucille Ix, 22, based in New York and working across China and Vietnam, and Lucas Van de Woestyne, 27, based in Ghent, Belgium and working for a denim mill in China with a focus on Europe. Their families have been in the business for generations, and they have known each other since childhood. Their fathers worked together in denim mills in the United States. We talk about what surprised them when they entered the industry. How denim can be massive in volume but small in practice. How relationships hold over decades, even across competing companies. We also talk about how young people are received at shows, and why many veterans want new people to enter the industry and stay. We get into sustainability in plain terms. What their friends actually care about when they buy clothes. Why quality and longevity are easier for consumers to hold than technical claims. Lucas points to a structural gap: mills are expected to innovate, but brands do not always want to pay for the price of that innovation. We also touch trade and geopolitics, the way duties and tariffs can change decisions overnight, and why being informed is now part of the job. We end on what success looks like to them: community, continuity, and the people behind the product. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Lucille Ix Marketing & Sales Assistant, Advanced Denim Advanced Denim, LinkedIn, Instagram Luccas Van de Woestyne Marketing Director Europe, Freedom Denim Freedom Denim, LinkedIn Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    42 min
  5. Ep 57—FRESH BLOOD, Part 2: Denim and Transparency with Beyza Baykan

    FEB 25

    Ep 57—FRESH BLOOD, Part 2: Denim and Transparency with Beyza Baykan

    This is Part Two of our FRESH BLOOD series, where I sit down with the next generation of denim leaders and ask what they see that we may not. FRESH BLOOD is about perspective. It is about how young professionals view sustainability, transparency, collaboration, and the future of this industry. In this episode, I speak with Beyza Baykan, founder of HMS Hand Made Stone. At 26, with a background in mathematics and international relations from USC and experience at the World Bank, she chose to build a business inside denim rather than outside of it. HMS develops a patented, upcycled pumice alternative designed to reduce sludge, water use, and waste while maintaining the aesthetics brands expect. But this conversation goes beyond product. We talk about greenwashing. We talk about whether collaboration actually leads to change. We discuss transparency, ethics, regulation, and what responsibility designers and brands should carry. Beyza is candid about what surprised her in the industry and what she believes must change. Fresh Blood is about listening to the people who are already shaping what comes next. Have a listen. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Beyza Baykan Founder & CEO of Baytech, HMS Hand Made Stone HMS Hand Made Stone, Linked-In, HMS Instagram, Personal Instagram Interested in being featured on The Jeansland Podcast as our next Fresh Blood guest?  Reach out! Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    32 min
  6. Ep 56—FRESH BLOOD, Part 1: A Different View of the Future with Kaela Bonaquist and William Wood

    FEB 18

    Ep 56—FRESH BLOOD, Part 1: A Different View of the Future with Kaela Bonaquist and William Wood

    This is our second two-part special, and this time I step back and listen. Fresh Blood is about renewal. Every industry either regenerates itself or slowly hardens. In this episode, I sit down with Kaela Bonaquist from Lenzing and William Wood from Material Exchange to hear how the next generation sees denim, sourcing, fibers, and technology. They are already inside the system. Upstream in fibers. In sourcing platforms. In the mechanics of supply chains. They are not nostalgic, and they are not sentimental about how things used to be. They talk about traceability as a baseline expectation. Digital tools as normal. Automation as overdue. Sustainability not as a marketing layer, but as responsibility tied directly to cost, incentives, and decision-making. We discuss fiber realities, cotton, polyester, Tencel, blends, and the tension between performance, price, and environmental claims. We get into transparency, government regulation, and whether parts of the industry are structurally misaligned with their own public promises. And at the end, I ask them a simple question. If you ran this industry for a weekend, what would you change? Part 1 sets the tone. This is less about criticism and more about expectation. If you enter this business today, what feels broken, what feels promising, and what simply feels overdue. If the future of denim has a different voice, this is it. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Kaela Bonaquist Business Development – East Coast & Canada, Lenzing Fibers Inc. Lenzing Fibers Inc., Linked-In William Wood Product Development & Sales Manager Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    48 min
  7. Ep 55: The Experience Architect: Arne Koefoed

    FEB 11

    Ep 55: The Experience Architect: Arne Koefoed

    Andrew sits down with Arne Koefoed, co-founder of WINK, to talk about how throwing parties slowly turned into a creative life. Arne never planned on designing experiences. There was no event school, no formal path. It started with squats, punk parties, and rave culture, and with the realization that bringing people together could be just as creative as making an object. That first party set the tone for everything that followed. Over time, that same instinct carried Arne from underground scenes to working with some of the biggest brands in the world. What’s striking is how little the spirit has changed. The scale is different, but the mindset is still about energy, emotion, and making people feel something real. They talk about why the best events feel more like memories than productions, why fun is often misunderstood as something unserious, and how experience design is often less about control and more about trust. At its core, this is a conversation about creativity without a rulebook, about designing moments instead of things, and about how some of the most meaningful work begins by simply opening the door and seeing who shows up. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Arne Koefoed Founder and Head of Ideas at WINK Instagram, Linked-In Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    33 min
  8. Ep 54: The Cost of Rushing Innovation

    FEB 4

    Ep 54: The Cost of Rushing Innovation

    Andrew reflects on a new report from the Transformers Foundation, Unlocking Equity in Innovation, and why so much meaningful innovation never makes it to market. The supply chain spends years and real money developing better fibers, cleaner chemistry, and smarter processes, only to be told to prove everything in 18 months or less. Andrew shares a personal story about a breakthrough alternative to indigo that failed not because it didn’t work, but because the industry didn’t want to wait, didn’t want to risk change, and preferred the devil it knew. Using examples like Tencel™, polyester, and stretch denim, Andrew reminds us that real innovation takes decades, not seasons. When brands push timelines and costs downstream, that isn’t innovation. It’s cost shifting. The episode closes with reflections from Kingpins New York. Thank you to our sponsor Inside Denim. Please follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

    4 min
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5
out of 5
12 Ratings

About

This is why I do this. Jeansland is a podcast about the ecosystem in which jeans live. There are an estimated 26 million cotton farmers around the world, and about 25% of their production goes into jeans, which could mean 6.2 million farmers depend on denim. I read estimates that at least 1 million people work in retail selling jeans, and another 1.5 to 2 million sew them. And then there are all the label producers, pattern makers, laundries, chemical companies, machinery producers, and those that work in denim mills. I mean, the jeans industry, which is bigger than the global movie and music business combined, employs a lot of human beings. And many of them, like me, love jeans. The French philosopher and existentialist Simone de Beauvoir, when visiting New York, said, "Everyone in the New York subway is a novel." I never met her, but I guess she made the observation because of the incredible diversity of people who ride the subway system. I'm convinced the people in our jeans industry are like those in the subway. They are unique, with rich and complex stories to tell, and I want to hear them. And deep inside me, I think you might feel the same way. https://jeansland.co/

Information

  • Creator
    Jeansland
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    61
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Jeansland Podcast
  • Show Website
    Jeansland Podcast

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