Eco-chic fashion profile: Pierre Andres Senizergues of Sole Technologies
Pierre Andre Senizergues wants his Sole Technology Inc. apparel company to be enironmentally friendly. “If I can have a company that can work on the green model, it might inspire other companies and we’ll have a green revolution -- like the Industrial Revolution, but only with everyone trying to reduce their carbon footprint,” he says.
Senizergues started his business 20 years ago by relaunching Etnies, a French skate shoe brand, from a 300-square-foot office in the shadow of Disneyland. Today, Sole Technology includes the brands eS, Emerica, ThirtyTwo and Altamont Apparel. He won’t divulge exact sales figures, but he says recent reports of $200 million in annual sales are in the ballpark.
Senizergues was inspired, partly, by a 2002 visit to the Colorado ranch of actress-activist Daryl Hannah, where a caretaker was driving a car that ran on vegetable oil. “It not only used up the oil,” he says, “but it also cut down the consumption of petroleum and reduced the possibility of war [over that petroleum] at the same time.”