IWD Sea Swim Mini Series - Ep 5 - Jo-Anne Godden, Founder of Ruby Moon Swimwear

Jo-Anne Godden is the founder of Ruby Moon which designs and produces ethical and sustainable swim and active wear for women. During her 25 years of working in the fashion industry, Jo became acutely aware of the sustainability challenges inherent in this space. She decided to launch her own solution and in 2011, Ruby Moon was born. The company is not only unique in terms of their products, but they also transform their own waste and donate 100% of their profit into microloans for women entrepreneurs around the world. Jo is committed to activate women’s potential and elevate their status in communities where they often don’t have a voice.

In this episode we discuss Jo's motivation for starting her business as well as her love of sea swimming and involvement in the IWD Sea Swim.  We also dive into a conversation about sustanable and ethical approach to business and the importance of circularity as a business model.

This episode is part of a 6 part mini series in collaboration with PinkNicky Blog in support of the IWD Sea Swim 2024. Each episode is 10 -15 minutes long and shines a light on one of the women involved in their event, their reasons for doing so and the benefits they have personally experienced from living life  adventurously.

To find out more about Ruby Moon visit

www.rubymoon.org.uk

Email Jo at hello@rubymoon.org uk 

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Transcript

In a podcast episode, Jo Godden, founder of Ruby Moon Swimwear, discusses her sustainable and ethical swimwear and activewear brand. After 25 years in the fashion industry, Godden launched Ruby Moon to address sustainability challenges. The brand uses ocean waste to create its products and donates 100% of its profits to micro loans for women entrepreneurs globally. Ruby Moon started trading on International Women's Day in 2011, aligning with its mission to support women entrepreneurs. The brand also organizes monthly full moon swims in Brighton, where it is based. Godden encourages others to consider the circular economy when starting a business, emphasizing the importance of considering the end life of a product.

Nicki (00:00):

Okay, so today I am really excited to welcome the next guest in our International Women's Day CWI collaboration. So this is a six part miniseries that we're running in collaboration with Pink Nicky blog. So you might have caught some of those previous episodes. And we are shining a spotlight on some of the women who are involved, whether sponsoring or supporting the event and who will be joining on March the ninth when it takes place in Brighton. And so today I'm delighted to be speaking to Jo Godden. Jo is the founder of Ruby Moon Swimwear and after 25 years of working in the fashion industry, conscious of the challenges with sustainability that she witnessed and that are inherent in this space, she decided to launch her own solution. So Ruby Moon offers sustainable and ethical swimwear and activewear and transforming ocean waste, and they donate over a hundred over, that's not possible. They donate a hundred percent of their profits to micro loans for women entrepreneurs around the world. So just in that very sort of short introduction, there is so much there that I could pick up on in terms of the work, the incredible work that Jo is doing, but it's such a thrill to have her here. So Joe welcome to the show. It's such a pleasure to have you here.

Jo (01:20):

Thank you for inviting me.

Nicki (01:22):

And so just to get started, I'd really love to know from you why you've chosen to be involved with the International Women's Day Seed Swim. What is it about the event, what it is about International Women's Day that's captured you and yeah, really what's motivated you to take part?

Jo (01:39):

So International Women's Day is a very special day for Ruby Moon as a business. We actually started trading on International Women's Day in 2011, which seems a lifetime ago now. Oh wow. The reason we started on that day is because we have a social impact that you mentioned with women entrepreneurs. So it seemed a natural fit to start the business on that day. And also we currently and have done for the last four years, run four Moon swim events here in Brighton. We're a Brighton based business as well, so we run those every four moon. And so it just seemed a natural actual progression. In fact, we started with the International Women's Day swims last year with Nicky, with Pink Nicky, and it was a resounding success. So of course, why wouldn't we want to do it again this year?

Nicki (02:45):

Amazing. I want to know more about these monthly full Moon swims. What's involved? Tell me more about it.

Jo (02:53):

Well, they're very unofficial. It's just a group of fabulous people will get together on the beach and we generally have some yoga to start with from yoga in the lanes and then we have a dip and afterwards we have a wonderful DJ, Ben Williams, who will come and play some music for us. So it's very much a celebration on the beach every fall moon.

Nicki (03:25):

Oh, absolutely. Love that. And I'd love to know a little bit more about your own, because you mentioned just before we were starting that sea swimming is something that you are also sort of passionate about than you get involved in. I'd love to know how that sort of started and therefore the idea that came about for your business as well.

Jo (03:44):

Sure. So I suppose I was caught up with the explosion of sea swimming during Covid, had done some sea swimming before, but not all year round until covid happened. And then it just became an outlet like the thousands of other people that have done the same during Covid. It became the only place you could exercise and enjoy the great outdoors when everything was in lockdown really. But the start of my business happened as I mentioned before in 2011. And well, I decided that I could no longer be part of the international global fashion industry as it stood or as it stands at this time just because of the amount of environmental social degradation that happens in the industry. And I wanted to prove that it is possible to have a clothing company that brings benefit rather than degrades both people and planets.

Nicki (05:01):

So interesting. I was just thinking about the timing as well back in 2011. I mean, there's so much more awareness nowadays. I think about, as you said, this idea of fast fashion and the contrast and people trying to live more sustainably. But I'd imagine back then actually what you were trying to create in some ways was relatively novel and different and there probably weren't a lot of models or templates to how you go about it.

Jo (05:30):

You're absolutely right. Back then I spent a lot of time explaining why we have to change the way we do business and the way we source our closing, who it's made by even why it's important. I mean, people weren't even aware of the amount of plastic we have in general and also in our oceans. So I spent a lot of time explaining to people why it's important that we have to make a radical change,

Jo (06:04):

Which I don't have to do now. Thank goodness.

Nicki (06:06):

I was just thinking that it shifted so much in that direction. Like you said, you don't have to make those explanations anymore, but I was just wondering as well about that because your business model itself is quite unique in that you give a hundred percent of your profits to women entrepreneurs for these micro loans. And again, I would be really interested to know how did that come about and how did that sort of combination of sustainable fashion and sort of recycled clothing and using ocean waste and then what you do with the profits, where did you get that sort of combination I suppose?

Jo (06:45):

So I really wanted to have a social enterprise. I wanted, first of all, I wanted to have impact. So the way we have environmental impact is to have recycled materials and we also only manufacture in Europe. We would never manufacture in Asia, for example. But in terms of social impact, we felt that that was as important really. So there is a social impact in the fact that we don't exploit workers in the supply chain. Everything is stumbled in Europe and it's all done, certified fair wage, et cetera, et cetera, which is really important. But we also wanted to have even more of an impactful women. I felt it was important to invest in women through micro credit loans because not everyone has a safety net and when you are trying to bring up children or educate them, it's really, really important that a woman has her own income so that she can plan and also fight for the really important things like nutrition, education, housing for children, which sometimes they don't always get from a father figure. So that is the reason why we've specifically chosen women to invest in.

Nicki (08:23):

I love the sort of, I guess the connections that we through what you are trying to do and then like you said, your own passions for being by the ocean and for getting people out on a monthly basis in person as well and how that all connects. I was just wondering if somebody's listening to this and they're thinking, and often I ask people to give their one piece of advice if someone wants to live more. And I think if someone is at the other end of this podcast and listening to you speak, and like you said, I want to have an impact actually. It's not just about me at a personal level wanting to try something new in my own life, but actually I want to make a difference. I want to have an impact. I mean, what's the one piece of it advice given your experience that you would give?

Jo (09:17):

Well, I'm a huge advocate of the circular economy, so everything we do is about enabling circularity. So for example, when the loans come back to us, we reinvest in other women. So the money is going round and round and we've just began an initiative about two years ago to actually recycle swimwear in itself, which is currently unrecyclable. So we have a technology to do that now for which we are expanding and we're seeking investment for that. So I would say if you're looking at forming a business or doing something, now look at circularity because it really is a great way to base your business. So looking at the impact, looking at the way when you design your business almost, what can you do to complete the circle, whether that's human resources or actual resources or looking at the end of life of any product that you bring into existence, making sure it's got somewhere to go at its end of its first life.

Nicki (10:30):

Absolutely. Love that. I think there's something so interesting just in that concept of circularity as a whole as well and how it could extend. So even if somebody's not thinking of starting their own business or whether it's in the workplace or whether it's in their personal life wanting to start, whether taking sea swimming as an example, that linkage between, I dunno whether I was listening to another podcast I was hearing the other day, I think somebody was talking about how there's so much of an emphasis on what we can get, even in terms of talking about nature are supporting our wellbeing, what we take from nature in terms of I'm going to go into nature like it's not part of us or ourselves and I'm going to go out there and I'm going to take something. And not to say that there's not so many wonderful benefits we can get for our physical and mental health as well, but just this idea about giving back at the same time, like you said, that sort of circularity of I am receiving these benefits, but also I'm giving whether that's a beach clean or making purchasing decisions that mean that you are protecting the environment that you're benefiting from too.

(11:48)
So thank you so much for sharing that, Joe. That's so interesting. I could explore that for so much longer, much longer. But if people want to find out more about you, about Ruby Moon, about the business, where can they go?

Jo (11:59):

So please come to our website, which is ruby moon.org.uk and if you want to email me, it's hello@rubymoon.org uk.

Nicki (12:10):

Fantastic. Thanks. Journal, pop all those links in the show notes so that anybody listening can go and find you and find out more and see your beautiful clothing as well, because I was checking it out obviously a bit earlier and I was like, oh yeah, some really gorgeous items on there too. So please do go and check out Joe's website and obviously I will put the links wrap for the International Women's Day Sea Swim in there as well if you want to join them on the 9th of March. Jo, thank you so much. It's been such a pleasure to meet you and to hear more about your business and I wishing you all the very best as well.

Jo (12:42):

Thanks for the opportunity.

Nicki (12:43):

Thank you. Bye

Jo (12:45):