The Spice Girls’ T-shirts were supposed to champion female empowerment – a call for “gender justice” that would raise money for charity.

Only there was this: The tees were made by women in Bangladesh working in inhumane conditions while being paid what amounted to a slave wage, according to an investigation by The Guardian.

Guardian investigation reveals Spice Girls T-shirts sold to raise money for Comic Relief’s “gender justice” campaign were made at a factory in Bangladesh where women earn 35p an hour during & claim to be verbally abused & harassed. My report from Gazipur: https://t.co/NrzKsZjBtb pic.twitter.com/8ZdBMV8O33

— Simon Murphy (@murphy_simon) January 20, 2019

The Spice Girls, an all-female musical group popular in the 1990s that’s enjoyed a recent nostalgia-driven renewal in popularity, designed the shirts to say “#IWannaBeASpiceGirl.” A portion of proceeds of sales from the approximately $25 shirts were to go to Comic Relief’s fund to champion “equality for women.”

But The Guardian investigation revealed a sad irony: Bangladeshi women machinists laboring 54 hours a week in a factory for a little more than $100 a month were the workforce that produced the shirts. “We don’t get paid enough and we work in inhuman conditions,” a machinist told The Guardian. The investigation alleged that the workers are verbally abused, called “daughters of prostitutes” for failing to hit targets The Guardian characterized as impossible. From the report:

• Employees are forced to work overtime to hit “impossible” targets of sewing thousands of garments a day, meaning they are sometimes working 16-hour shifts that finish at midnight.
• Factory workers who do not make the targets are verbally abused by management and reduced to tears. Some have been made to work despite ill-health.

Saying they take the allegations seriously, Comic Relief and the Spice Girls deflected blame to Represent, a crowd-selling platform that enables anyone to create and sell custom merchandise, that the girl group and Comic Relief engaged to source the shirts. In a statement, Comic Relief said that it and the Spice Girls conducted ethical sourcing checks on the supplier that Represent said it would use. However, Represent allegedly switched the supplier to a firm called Stanley/Stella, which then turned for production to the factory where the alleged abuse of the women workers occurred. Full statement from Comic Relief:

This is our statement on the @guardian's reporting on the @spicegirls T-Shirts:https://t.co/kDxMIvGjrg pic.twitter.com/F5Nii6SHBT

— Comic Relief (@comicrelief) January 20, 2019

A representative for the Spice Girls responded to the allegations by saying: “The band are grateful that this information has been brought to their attention…As to be expected, they are deeply shocked and appalled by these claims and have demanded a full explanation from Represent…The band intend(s) to demand that Represent donate their profits from this initiative to localized campaigns in Bangladesh.”

Represent, which is not ASI-listed, has offices in London, Los Angeles and Prague, according to a company bio. Bryan Baum, Andrej Pancik and Leo Seigal founded Represent. While at Oxford University, the three also started Prizeo, a crowdfunding platform that partners with celebrities to raffle off exclusive prizes for charity. According to the Represent bio, the largest apparel campaign on the platform sold 46,000 units and generated more than $1 million in 27 days. “Many sports and entertainment influencers have already launched successful campaigns on Represent, including Stephen Amell, Seth Rogen, Will Ferrell, and George R. R. Martin,” the company says.

The fallout over the Spice Girls tees builds on a recent spate of high-profile investigations that have revealed inhumane conditions in overseas factories from which apparel is sourced. In December, an Associated Press report revealed that promo industry supplier Badger Sportswear (asi/37876) was sourcing apparel from a Chinese factory the AP said was using forced labor. North Carolina-based Badger Sportswear has since ended its relationship with Hetian Taida Apparel Co. Ltd.

In separate situation, alleged human rights abuses at Vietnam-based apparel factories recently compelled Norway Pension Fund Global, the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, to stop investing in Texwinca Holdings – a Hong Kong-based investment holding company in the yarn, fabric and apparel business. Texwinca is the main shareholder in Megawell Industrial Ltd., which came under fire for what Norwegian officials characterized as “serious or systematic” human rights violations at its Hugo Knit and Kollan factories in Vietnam. Discrimination against women, health and safety risks, and restrictions on the right to form unions were among the alleged abuses.

For promotional products firms, the recent sourcing scandals are cautionary tales. They emphasize the importance of thoroughly vetting partners and facilities where products are produced. That vetting should include boots-on-the-ground firsthand assessments of factories. Failure to partner wisely could result in working with unethical manufacturers, which isn’t only morally wrong, but also a potential business disaster, as it could end up embarrassing end-clients and costing both distributors and suppliers their reputations and business.

Perhaps, too, the need for increased diligence is growing in importance. In the Comic Relief/Spice Girls case, maybe a contractual clause or similar agreement should have been made binding Represent to use the supplier they initially said they would use or obligating the company to notify Comic Relief/Spice Girls if the supplier was to be changed so those end-clients could conduct further sourcing checks. If such a clause existed – and we don’t know if it did or didn’t – then Represent really has a lot to answer for.

Bottom line is this: Source smartly. There’s too much at stake to do otherwise.