Use green to go green.
That was the message Francisco Pinedo brought to Colorado from California last week during a visit to promote his environmentalist furniture.
“Cisco” Pinedo was born in Mexico to a farmer and a tailor. He grew up in south Los Angeles and got his start in the furniture business by working in an upholstery shop after school to help support his family.
Today Pinedo, 44, who founded the multimillion-dollar home-furnishings business Cisco Brothers, advocates returning to traditional materials and manufacturing practices. To hear Pinedo tell it, a love of design flourishes in his entrepreneurial heart, but furnishing healthier homes is what occupies his mind.
Q: Environmentalism in retail is getting plenty of press, but is it still a tough sell to a budget-minded consumer?
A: It’s totally an educational process. … People need to see furniture as part of the investment in their home. If you buy a piece of furniture that is disposable, you’re going to have to replace it in three or four years, and you’re really not making a good investment. You’re adding more pollution to the environment, you’re really not doing a good service to your home, and for the most part it’s not going to be as comfortable as it should be. You have to educate yourself and decide: Do I want to make this investment now, or do you want to buy furniture two or three times within a 10-year period?
Q: You might sell one sustainable sofa today but somewhere else they’re selling 50 that will end up in landfills.
A: It’s really overwhelming. People don’t realize that 99 percent of the products out there, everything that we touch, is petroleum-based. It’s not only that it’s not good for the environment, it’s not good for you as a human being, to have it inside your house and you’re breathing all these fumes that are out-gassing from your furniture. We create these little environments with all these crazy toxins, and then we go in there and sleep?
Q: Talk about your company’s process of switching to sustainable woods and fabrics from conventional materials.
A: I tell people to think about sustainability the way you think about transportation, and that this company is like a hybrid car. The first thing we asked ourselves was “What impacts the environment the most?” The reality is, it’s the woods that we use because they’re chopping down trees. So we started with the wood. Everything that we do now is with Forest Stewardship Council-certified wood. They keep track from the day the tree is planted from seed all the way to the day when the wood is certified in my showroom or factory to make these goods. So you as a consumer can really track down where that wood came from to make your sofa. That’s a huge step.
Q: What about the fabric?
A: What we decided to do, since the fabric is what people touch and feel the most, is treat our fabrics by washing them with an organic, natural detergent to take out anything that the fabric is holding from the production process. So we make sure that piece of fabric is as close as it’s going to get to being organic. That was a first step. After that, we decided to challenge our mills. We said “You know what guys? We really need you guys to start bringing us more sustainable products.” And all of a sudden, they started bringing a little bit here and a little bit there.
Three months ago, I went back to them and said, “for this coming collection, we’re not going to buy one piece of conventional fabric, so if you don’t bring me at the minimum (fabrics) using recycled materials, don’t even show them to me.” Out of 200 suppliers, maybe 10 came up with the product. That really made my job easy.
…The ultimate message I have for people is that they have the ultimate key to “green,” and it’s buying power. Economics will force other companies to get involved in sustainability. (Those companies) are going to win, because the consumer will give back to them.
Cisco Brothers products are available in Colorado through Forebears in Telluride, Djuna in Denver and Montocito Loft & Home in Basalt. The company’s new eco-friendly, sustainable Basal Living collection is on view and sold through HW Home.
