The weeks that have passed since Liam Mooney and Emma Cochrane designed a cap with the viral slogan “Canada is not for sale” in response to President Donald Trump have taught them more about the state of the manufacturing sector. manufacturing in Canada than on politics.
Posted at 6:46 p.m.
Tara Deschamps
The Canadian Press
The two Ottawa marketers behind the caps worn flamboyantly by Ontario Premier Doug Ford last week say they realized how difficult it is to produce a cap that’s entirely made in Canada.
“Imagine you are a snake and you are trying to eat a giant bowling ball. That’s what we experienced here,” said Mr. Mooney, co-founder of business consultancy Jackpine Dynamic Branding.
Over the past few weeks, the duo have approached several players in the apparel industry for help and have generally heard the same refrain: They don’t make caps entirely in Canada because the cost is very high and demand is not there.
Since then, Mr. Mooney and Mr.me Cochrane have found hats made entirely domestically, but have not yet found a long-term solution. They therefore mainly rely on caps imported from Vietnam, Bangladesh and China and toques from the United States, which are then embroidered in Canada.
Historical reality
The difficulty in manufacturing clothing or accessories entirely in Canada stems from years of hard blows to the country’s textile industry, which lost much of the clothing manufacturing capacity it had developed in the 19e century when industrialists migrated to Canada and took advantage of the introduction of the sewing machine.
“They started the clothing industry in Canada in the big cities, so Toronto, Montreal, Winnipeg… but what happened in the 1980s is that these industries started to establish themselves in the foreigner,” recalled Henry Navarro Delgado, associate professor of fashion at Toronto Metropolitan University.
They were lured away from Canada largely because labor, materials and clothing components like zippers, thread and buttons were cheaper elsewhere.
“In China, a t-shirt, depending on its complexity and whether or not it has a print, could be produced for as little as a dollar,” noted Mr. Navarro Delgado. Can you imagine this? We simply cannot afford it. »
Canada is lagging behind
Today, World Trade Organization data on clothing exporters shows that Canada isn’t even in the top 10, while China and the European Union reign supreme. They are followed by Bangladesh, Vietnam, Turkey, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Hong Kong and Pakistan.
But if we look at the other side – the importers – Canada is in sixth place in 2021, behind the EU, the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom and China.
Much of the clothing manufacturing that remains in Canada is related to military or firefighter uniforms as well as clothing for extreme environments, such as cold weather, Mr. Navarro Delgado said.
Most of the components they use are not entirely made in Canada.
“Jeans, for example, have rivets, metal buttons, metal zippers and special thread for embroidery,” he pointed out. When you get to these very complex garments, it’s almost impossible to produce them locally. »
-Pay more
Still, Jimil Ataman, an assistant professor in the department of human ecology at the University of Alberta, argued that many small businesses persist, often by importing materials and pieces that Canadian seamstresses assemble.
“But all of that drives up the final price in a way that I think frankly shocks most consumers,” she noted. We’ve all been so accustomed for years and years to thinking that a baseball cap should cost $15 to buy, but the fact is, if you wanted to produce that cap ethically, completely within the labor laws and Canadian policy standards, then the price would be much higher. »
Mr. Mooney and M’s “Canada is Not for Sale” capsme Cochrane are priced at $45 to $55, while toques sell for $40.
The idea for the cap came to them on January 8, while they were watching Doug Ford in an interview at Jesse Watters Primetime respond to US President Donald Trump’s social media wishes to see Canada annexed to the United States.
« Emma [Cochrane] and I looked at each other across the couch and stood up and said, “We have to do something about this. “It’s absurd, this kind of disrespect,” Mr. Mooney said.
That same evening, they had designed a model and made their first sales.
The caps were made to order, so whenever a request came in, they honored the purchase by having a cap embroidered.
Orders for about 50,000 hats poured in when Doug Ford wore one of the caps to a Jan. 15 meeting with Canadian prime ministers. Around the same time, Shopify President Harley Finkelstein talked about buying one on social media and the knockoffs started popping up.
PHOTO JUSTIN TANG, CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
Ontario Premier Doug Ford wearing the famous cap as he arrives for a first ministers meeting in Ottawa, January 15, 2025.
M. Mooney et Mme Cochrane knew they needed a design that could be manufactured in mass quantities, but a Canadian-made cap wasn’t easy to find – or even often in demand.
“We’ve heard from several suppliers that it’s not really something that people ask them for very, very often because it’s just a lot cheaper to make it overseas,” said Ms.me Cochrane.
As they continue to look for an entirely made-in-Canada solution, they embroider caps in Toronto, where they are capable of producing 1,000 per day.
Although Mr Mooney admits it has been an “adventure” to get to this point, he and Mme Cochrane also finds it heartening to see how many people in Canada have stepped up to try to get their product made.
“There is solidarity,” Mr. Mooney said. When things are bad, we gather our strength. »
