Ralph Lauren’s 2014 Olympic offerings hail from 16 U.S. states
With 100 days to go before the Winter Olympics begin in Sochi, Russia, the U.S. Olympic Committee and Ralph Lauren unveiled the first pieces of a domestically made Team USA wardrobe produced across nearly a third of U.S states.
Our Sports section colleague David Wharton wrote about the reveal of the closing ceremony outfits earlier Tuesday, so we aren’t going to rehash it. (We will, however, note that we find that navy wool peacoat with the red banner stripe particularly fetching as far as cold weather gear goes.)
But since longtime official Olympic outfitter Ralph Lauren caught heat during the 2012 London Olympics for Team USA togs that were made in China, and Tuesday’s news release made a point of mentioning that “Ralph Lauren’s 2014 Team USA Parade Uniforms [are] proudly made in the USA,” we reached out to Team Lauren officials to see if they could tell us -- with specificity -- where in the U.S. the garments that make up the collection were manufactured.
We got a lot more specificity than we’d expected: a laundry list of no fewer than 16 states across the great US of A where the various and sundry pieces of the full Olympic collection were produced -- including not just the closing ceremony outfits unveiled Tuesday but also the athlete’s village wear and the yet-to-be-revealed opening ceremony uniforms as well.
The Ralph Lauren representative we contacted didn’t specify which garments were made in which state but provided the following list: California, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maine, Michigan, North Carolina, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Vermont and Wisconsin.
Personally, as a boy from the Green Mountain State I can’t wait to find out what Vermont businesses added to the mix. Given the climate -- and the fact that it’s for the Winter Games -- I’m guessing headgear or mittens.
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