Let’s play a word game pairing up two words. If one word is said, the other one would automatically come at the top of our minds. Here it goes: Cloud – rain, igloo – ice-cream, jute –sacks! Or sacks – jute! Even though jute is called the golden fiber of Bangladesh, jute is mostly used to produce lower grade commodities like: sacks, rope, simple wire and bags etc. There are only a few companies producing jute diversified goods and selling those in home and abroad. Yet they are mostly making and selling jute diversified goods to gain business, but hardly creating a brand out of it!   

The pioneering credit of creating a brand of jute and cotton made designer products goes to Asix. The company started its journey in 2011 with the tagline, “Fashion your future with nature.” Asix use 100% bio degradable Jute and Cotton based materials to create nature friendly yet very fashionable products.  It is mainly involved in making home textile, fashion accessories and hand-made shoes products.  Asix believes eco-friendly products can be fashionable and stand firm to make a better world by using natural fibres in its brand.

As a brand, Asix offers its national and international customers a unique range of collection with contemporary yet simplistic and fashionable outlook upholding the commitment towards a safe and beautiful earth. Its product range includes Flat (bed) sheets, fitted sheets, curtains, cushion covers, duvet covers, various fashionable bags  including back packs, shoes, moneybags, laptop bags, napkins, pot holders, oven mitts, tea towels, bath towels, bath mats and bath robes. The products are available at super-shops like Unimart, and Shwapno or one can purchase the products from Kaymu.com.bd.

Asix products symbolize the spirit of human desire with the sync of nature. The home-textile product of Asix has a tagline, “There is nothing like home” inspiring consumers to bring nature at their home. Asix Home textiles range has four main segments: room textile, table textile, bath textile, and kitchen textile.

Asix Shoes spiritualize the concept, “Walk tall, love earth” to keep one grounded and closer to mother earth and be still confident and courageous in style. These shoes not only are trendy and fashionable, they breathe too! Jute made shoes keep the feet healthy with tenderness and air circulation. And fashion accessories having a tagline of “be different, be unrivaled” are trendy enough to make anyone standout in the crowd.

In the tenure of last 3.5 years, Asix has come a long way. While creating local market, the company is now exporting its range to different countries of Europe, America and Middle East. The journey has not been a smooth one though. Afsana Asif, Managing Partner of Asix said, “At the very beginning, we used to outsource almost everything. But the problems with the vendors were that they were not ready to take the challenge of introducing customized jute and natural products bringing in style and fashion at the same time. So we had to take over the production. As of now maintaining supply chain is the toughest job due to lack of proper business environment and infrastructure.”

With her 18 years of experience in customized fashion design, Ms. Afsana, in her designs creates a blend of indigenous culture with modern and future trends. While not giving up the multidimensional lifestyle of western worlds, she speaks of taking inspiration from nature for her designs and they truly reflect on Asix products. After attending Frankfort Fair last year she got the exposure to experience international trend and demands. She thanked EPB for creating such unique opportunities for Bangladesh’s emerging small entrepreneurs. It was a turning point for Asix towards export. “We need to adopt the policy of nature friendly practices from both personal level and organization level. Government is trying to promote jute made products. But private sectors should also contribute to the cause. For example, last year a company ordered 300 prayer rugs made of Jute cotton and distributed those to their external stakeholders as gifts”. She continued, “Instead of buying plastic and artificial products, today’s aspiring value driven marketers can involve us in designing their corporate gift offerings”. She was confident in expressing that Asix can help corporate entities promote their brands with eco-friendly products to their internal and external stakeholders. “This will encourage the use of world class Bangladeshi natural materials like cotton and jute in a fashionable manner; contribute in reducing import of cheap products as well as uphold our effort in making a better world. If we can make them say yes to Bangladesh’s best natural material jute and cotton, it will surely emerge as a big change in the society,” Ms. Afsana added.

The use of jute bags will be mandatory after October 25 this year for packaging six essential goodslike paddy, rice, wheat, maize, fertilizer and sugar; following the Jute Packaging Act 2010. This shows governments commitment toward rejuvenating the golden days of the golden fiber of Bangladesh. Just making the use of jute compulsory won’t fulfill the cause. It’s high time we created and promoted meaningful brands associated with jutes. Brand building will attract more focus to the jute industry and, it’s expected that emerging brands will unleash the true potential of jute industry and will take the industry to the level of our RMG sector one day.

Zig when others zag is an age old marketing thought. In this artificial world it’s high time we get natural to create a difference. Asix is a brand pioneering this thought for all of us.

by Iftekharul Dastagir