Is Black & Beech Ethical? Women-Led Apparel

What independent sources confirm

• Black & Beech is an accredited Living Wage Employer, listed in the Living Wage Foundation's register.
• In August 2023 the company filed new articles of association at Companies House committing it to have a material positive impact on society and the environment, and obliging its directors to prepare an annual impact report for members. This is a filed legal document rather than marketing copy.
• Black & Beech Ltd is on the Companies House register, number 13522233, registered in Cardiff, incorporated in July 2021 and active.
• Welsh Women's Aid states in its own newsroom that Black & Beech donated 5 pounds from every shirt in a 2021 collaboration.
• The Development Bank of Wales records lending the business 60,000 pounds in July 2024 following an earlier loan in 2022, and Companies House records the matching charge.

What Black & Beech reports about itself

These are the brand’s own statements. Purpose Picks has not independently confirmed them.

• The brand says 10 percent or more of profits go to feminist organisations. Its own 2022 impact report, the only one published, records 7.04 percent of net profit for that year.
• The brand says its suppliers hold GOTS, Fair Wear and WRAP accreditations and are Sedex members. Those certificates belong to the suppliers, not to Black & Beech, and no supplier is named.
• The brand says its t-shirts and sweaters are PETA certified vegan and that 95 percent of its cotton is organic, with the rest BCI cotton.
• B Corp certification is a stated ambition rather than something the brand holds, and the brand says so plainly on its own pages.

What this does not tell you

• No supplier or factory is named anywhere, so none of the supplier certifications can be checked. The t-shirts are made in Bangladesh and printed in Cardiff.
• The filed articles oblige the directors to produce an annual impact report, and the only one published covers 2022. Nothing has been published for 2023, 2024 or 2025.
• The brand's own pages contradict each other on how much has been donated, giving both 16,000 pounds and 13,000 pounds raised.
• Living Wage accreditation covers UK employment. It says nothing about pay at the Bangladeshi and Portuguese sites that make the garments.
• The company files small company accounts with no turnover disclosure, so no filed document tests the percentage-of-profit donation claim.

Who it suits

Someone buying feminist slogan tees, knitwear and gifts who wants part of the price to fund women's rights causes, and who accepts detailed but largely self-audited ethics claims from a very small business.

Sources

1. Living Wage Foundation, accredited employer register
2. Companies House, Black & Beech Ltd (13522233)
3. Companies House, filing history including the 2023 articles of association
4. Welsh Women's Aid, t-shirt collaboration announcement
5. Development Bank of Wales, Black & Beech case study
6. Black & Beech, Manifesto page (cotton, vegan, supplier and B Corp claims)
7. Black & Beech, 2022 Impact Report