Lac-Drolet, September 14, 2020. “It’s a tremendous honour to be a finalist at the Prix Femmes d’affaires du Québec in the Coup de cœur Desjardins COVID-19 category. After several very difficult months, this recognition means a great deal. I want to acknowledge the exceptional work of our team, our suppliers and our financial partners. None of this would have been possible without them. This truly is a team award,” says Julia Gagnon, Vice President of Operations and co-owner of Attraction.
Ms. Gagnon adds: “I also want to use this recognition, and the circumstances surrounding COVID-19, to share a message that is close to my heart: the purchasing power we have as consumers. When thousands of people each buy a mask, a T-shirt or a fleece sweatshirt, they support jobs across Canada for knitters, dyers, garment workers, screen printers, graphic designers, account managers and many others.
Multiply that effect across thousands of goods and services, and the whole country has an opportunity to thrive. Whenever possible, buy a Quebec-made product from a local business—that’s ideal. If that isn’t an option, at least choose a product distributed by a Quebec or Canadian company.”
At Attraction, the team hopes people wear its products with the same pride that goes into developing and making them. Buying Ethica, a locally made brand, or Initial, a brand designed and decorated in Quebec, helps sustain this second-generation family business. In Lac-Drolet, it also supports quality jobs equivalent to nearly one-quarter of the village’s working population.
Digital Investments
During the COVID-19 crisis, Attraction invested in e-commerce so it could offer both apparel brands directly to consumers online. Customers were invited to visit boutiqueethica.com to support local, ethical manufacturing or boutiqueinitial.com to support a homegrown business.
To introduce its products to more people in the region, Attraction also opened two shops that fall. The Attraction store at the company’s head office, 672 rue du Parc in Lac-Drolet, was open Fridays from noon to 4 p.m. through mid-December. A pop-up shop at the Maison du Granit in Lac-Drolet was open Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. through Thanksgiving.
How Attraction Adapted
During the crisis, Attraction adapted by manufacturing more than 500,000 masks in Quebec, along with thousands of certified Level 2 isolation gowns. It also redoubled its efforts to develop the platforms and partnerships needed to offer its Quebec-made Ethica brand directly to consumers online.
Foreign Workers
To support growth in its sewing operations, Attraction had recently recruited eight international workers. Four workers from Colombia and four from Guatemala were expected to arrive the following spring. With Lac-Drolet facing a housing shortage, Julia and Sébastien also purchased a former seniors’ residence to convert into housing for the new employees. “We hope to hire about ten international workers a year over the next few years to meet our sewing labour needs. The project is also intended to counter our region’s negative net migration. It supports our company’s growth while helping the community retain essential services such as the grocery store and school,” Julia says.
Sustainability Project
“The crisis also accelerated our sustainability projects. The biggest one involves finding a new use for our textile waste. We purchased a shredder—the only one of its kind that we knew of in Quebec’s apparel industry—to turn our fabric offcuts into cushion filling. That will allow us to repurpose more than 30,000 kg of material every year. Working with Coup de pouce, a social reintegration organization in Lac-Mégantic, we plan to launch a line of cushions and related products made with that filling this fall. They may well be the most ethical cushions ever made in Canada,” Julia concludes.
Attraction: Putting Your Image Front and Centre
Since 1980, Attraction has manufactured, imported and distributed apparel across Canada through promotional products distributors and souvenir retailers. Julia Gagnon and Sébastien Jacques, partners in business and in life and recipients of the 2019 PwC Les médaillés de la relève award, acquired the company from the Gagnon brothers in 2017.