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Image credit: The Impact Days

Sustainability is gaining traction as a major theme in each and every field! The number of startups working on a fair and sustainable future is growing with each passing day. 

In a bid to celebrate their work, the four largest municipalities – Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, and Utrecht, started a campaign in 2018 – The Impact Days. 

🏆 Meet the 20 EIT Digital finalists!

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This year, The Impact Days will take place for the fourth time on November 18, 19, and 20. The campaign aims to celebrate ‘Next Level’ entrepreneurship and show how they contribute to a fair and sustainable future.

From a social studio where fashion accessories are made to a restaurant that tackles food waste, we have listed next-level entrepreneurs in Amsterdam from various categories ranging from fashion, kids, food, fun, and design. Take a look.

Fashion

The Swapshop Amsterdam: The company is on a mission to extend the life of clothing and other fashion items and to make swapping the norm. Their initiative started in 2018 to make fashion consumption more sustainable and circular. 

Ziggy & Ayla: The company aims to create awareness about slow, circular, and fair fashion. Their collections are made from upcycled trashed textiles. 

CHHATTA POP-UP/STOCK SALE: CHHATTA POP-UP/STOCK SALE is an event where sustainable fashion pioneers come together in the heart of Amsterdam. During the two-day event, you can shop at various sustainable and circular fashion brands. The first edition of CHHATTA POP-UP/STOCK SALE will take place on Saturday, November 20 and Sunday, November 21 during The Impact Days. 

Soft Revolt: Soft Revolt is a sustainable Dutch lingerie brand that makes the first 3D knitted bralette that offers revolutionary support to all women with fuller cup sizes.

Red Orka: Red Orka is a sustainable babywear brand. As a circular business, the company offers baby rompers exclusively through a unique, sustainable subscription model. 

New Optimist: New Optimist is a clothing brand where clothes are made in an open, accessible social studio. The company aims to help vulnerable people find work by designing, producing, and selling clothing in Amsterdam.

Sustainable Fashion Gift: With the Sustainable Fashion Gift Card you can choose from more than 1000 sustainable items and experiences at 80+ affiliated fashion and lifestyle pioneers. These are brands, (web) shops, clothing libraries, exchange initiatives, and experiences such as workshops.

Zazi Vintage: Zazi Vintage makes luxury women’s clothing.

O My Bag: O My Bag makes leather bags in an eco-friendly and fair-made way. The company has bags and accessories for all genders. They also have a second-hand program on the website.

Maium: Maium is a fashionable rainwear brand designed in Amsterdam. The raincoats are made from recycled plastic. In addition, no harmful substances are used and the jackets are made under fair and healthy conditions.

Leger des Heils: It is a special store that sells good quality second-hand clothing and accessories. All clothing collected here are carefully selected and sold by people with a distance to the labour market.

Loop.a.life: Loop.a life is a circular and sustainable clothing brand. The company sells circular sweaters and cardigans for women and men made from recycled materials such as cotton and wool. In addition, their garments sometimes contain synthetic yarns made from waste or PET bottles.

Gray Label RENTED: The platform allows users to rent baby clothes via a flexible subscription service in a sustainable way. This extends the life of the items and users contribute to less CO2, waste, and pollution.

Scoon: Scoon is a webshop with sustainable fashion, accessories, care products, and gifts. 

BIEBY: BIEBY allows you to rent sustainably produced clothing for babies in sizes 50 to 92. Users can determine the number of pieces, new or used, and for how long. 

Zeefdrukmakers: The company with a decade of experience is known for screen printers for textiles and paper in Amsterdam. 

Yumeko: Yumeko is an online sustainable retail brand that makes luxury quality, organic & fairtrade bedlinen, duvets, pillows, mattresses, and towels.

Boro Atelier:  Boro Atelier wants to make the textile industry more social and sustainable. In the social workshop, textile products for adults and children are sewn, dyed, and printed with natural paints based on plants and minerals. 

Makers Unite: Makers Unite is a textile-based creative agency with a big social mission. The company offers a platform for social inclusion providing equal opportunities to newcomers and locals by making products with a story that matters.

LENA the fashion Library: At LENA, users can borrow and buy clothes from a collection of small designers, sustainable labels, and pre-loved items. The company aims to extend the life of clothing and wants to make a game-changing impact in the fashion industry.

Loenatix: Loenatix is a socially sustainable streetwear brand. All t-shirt designs are homemade and handmade silkscreen printed on Organic clothing.

Kringloop Centrum Zuidoost: In Kringloop Centrum Zuidoost you can discover a variety of second-hand jewels. In addition to the standard thrift items, this Recycling Center also has bicycles, building materials, and sports equipment.

Recycle Kid: At RecycleKid, users can buy and donate beautiful second-hand children’s clothing. In addition, they have sustainable toys such as cuddly toys made of recycled textiles and wooden toys.

De Lokatie: De Lokatie is a recycling company that contributes to extending the life of goods. Every year, De Lokatie recycles about 550 tons of household goods, which immediately results in a saving of 550 kg in CO2 emissions. In addition to these environmental benefits, the organisation offers workplaces for people at a great distance from the labour market.

Goat wool shop: The clothing shop offers products from sustainable brands such as Armedangels, Matt & Nat, MUD Jeans, Kings of Indigo and Kowtow. In addition to clothing and accessories, they also have bags, shoes, and beauty products. 

Fashion for Good: Fashion for Good Experience is an interactive fashion museum where you can learn how clothing is made and what new developments there are to make it more sustainable and fair.

Klabu: KLABU is a Dutch social startup that builds sports clubs in refugee camps to support the unbeatable spirit of refugees and improve lives. The sports clubs provide access to sports equipment and clothing on the basis of a library system, e-gaming, Wi-Fi, and solar power, all owned and managed by refugee and host communities.

Rambler: Rambler empowers youngsters to find their way in life through design. The platform provides a place for creative expression, skill development, and personal exploration. 

BrandMission: BrandMission offers women’s and men’s clothing, accessories, care products, and interior items from brands such as MUD Jeans, Armedangels, Alchemist, Loop.a life, and Maium.

Sukha: Sukha sells sustainable, fair trade, and handmade clothing and interior items from its own brand and international brands with the same standards.

Goat Organic Apparel: Goat Organic Apparel makes honest and sustainably produced basic t-shirts, sweaters, hoodies, and joggers from 100 per cent organic cotton.

Broer & Zus: Broer & Zus is a children’s store where they sell clothing from their own brand and others, including Bobo Choses and Mini Rodini, from organic cotton.

Studio JUX: Studio JUX provides fair trade and sustainable fashion from labels for men and women. They also sell guilt-free ceramics, baby gifts, natural candles, non-toxic nail polish, and more. 

Food

Zorgkwekerij Groen: Zorgkwekerij Groen is a daytime activity for adults and the elderly living at home, with a psychiatric imbalance and/or starting memory complaints.

EQpura: It offers space for 3-4 social workplaces/daytime activities aimed at young people, women, and vulnerable people from Nieuw-West, where they offer them the opportunity to participate in the social enterprise for a number of months, in combination with a Personal Development & Coaching trajectory, with the aim of shaping their own future in a positive way.

Wilder Land: Wilder Land makes herbal tea from herbs and flowers sown by farmers in the Netherlands. 

Wakulic: The platform offers fresh, lighter roasted coffee that is delivered directly from the coffee farmer to home.

De Tweede Jeugd: De Tweede Jeugd gives unsold loaves, which are only a day old, a second life. It makes  Supertosti’s, Bread & Butter, Croutons, Crostini, and Crackers.

Elietsa: Elietsa makes healthy Greek olive oil with a sustainable and transparent production process. Users can find out exactly from which orchard and which tree their olive oil comes.

Hannah’s: Hannah’s is a daycare centre where people with intellectual disabilities can learn and develop.

Dignita Westerpark: Dignita Westerpark offers a social and sustainable brunch. Dignita is part of the Not For Sale social enterprise model. Not For Sale is an international organisation that aims to offer certified training programs and support to a vulnerable target group through social enterprises.

Little Plant Pantry: Little Plant Pantry is the first plastic-free shop in Amsterdam. At Little Plant Pantry, users can come and shop with their own packaging for products such as rice, pasta, beans, (breakfast) cereals, herbs, nuts, coffee and tea, vegan cheese, and more. Shopping here contributes to minimal waste and a plant-based lifestyle.

Moyee: Moyee is the first Fairchain coffee brand in the world. They roast and package coffee in the country of origin, leaving 300 per cent more money in the coffee-producing country.

Karma Kebab: Karma Kebab makes the locally and sustainably produced celeriac-based kebab, with fresh pita and delicious garlic sauce.

Willicroft: Willicroft makes sustainable vegan cheese. The company aims to innovate to reduce its carbon footprint and help the dairy industry change more sustainably. 

Ching’s Tea Home: Ching’s Tea Home offers traditional tea and snacks. With pure tea, Asian snacks, and the art of tea making, Ching’s Tea Home connects the people of the neighbourhood.

Cafe de Ceuvel: De Ceuvel is a sustainable breeding ground for creative and social entrepreneurs on a former shipyard on the Van Hasselt Canal in Amsterdam-North. The site contains creative workplaces, a cultural centre around sustainability, a café-restaurant, spaces for rent, and a floating hotel.

Chocolatemakers: Chocolatemakers makes traditional, fair, and sustainable chocolate. As per the company’s claims, cocoa is purchased directly from the farmers for a good and fair price.

Restaurant Freud: In Freud, people with a psychological vulnerability work as cooks, hosts, or dishwashers. The delicious, varied dishes are inspired by Mediterranean cuisine and the spicy flavours from the Middle East.

De Buurtboerderij: De Buurtboerderij is run by volunteers and customers of De Regenboog Groep. People with a distance to the labour market are offered a safe and pleasant environment, under the guidance of permanent employees. They work in the service, in the kitchen, receive guests, help with weddings and parties and keep the farm clean and cozy.

Midwest: MidWest is a social enterprise, meeting place, and workplace with the aim of creating social impact in the neighbourhood.

Bakkerji Iambe: It is an organic bakery where people with intellectual disabilities work under the guidance of professional bakers.

De Groene Grifioen: De Groene Griffioen is an organic education and cheese farm. In the shop, they sell farm produce and other local products.

Kleiburg Brewery: The Christian community of the Kleiklooster established itself in 2015 in the Kleiburg flat. It has a brewery that was founded in accordance with age-old monastic tradition. 

A Beautiful Mess: A Beautiful Mess is a social enterprise and is an initiative of Refugee Company. The trainees of the cozy café are all residents of the asylum seekers’ centre. Trainees will find a free and safe place to work with a team and get a taste of the hospitality industry.

De VerbroederIJ: De VerbroederIJ is a meeting place in Amsterdam-North with a green harbour, city beach, and a restaurant with coffee, lunch, drinks, and a simple dinner menu. Further, it offers a place where local people from all walks of life can relax, play, have fun, collaborate, and do business.

De 7 Deugden: It is a modern brewery where people with disabilities are given the space to discover where their strength lies.

Theehuis De Akermolen:  De Akermolen is a former windmill without blades containing a special tea house where mentally handicapped people enjoy working in the kitchen or serving. 

Fruittuin van West: Fruittuin van West is a farm, organic shop and garden café. On the farm, users can come and pick organic or biodynamic fresh or long-life vegetables, fruit, and more themselves or buy in the shop..

Brewery De Prael: De Prael’s beer is made by people who are at a distance from the labour market often because of a psychiatric background.

Ctaste: Ctaste offers a dining experience in the dark served by Amsterdammers with a visual impairment.

Happy Tosti de Pijp: Happy Tosti is a social lunch restaurant consisting of employees with occupational disabilities.

Instock: Instock put food waste on the (menu) card! They do this by cooking with products that would otherwise be wasted. The company aims to contribute to raising awareness about food waste.

Thull’s: Thull’s sells pickles, homemade sauerkraut, mustard, chilli jam, and healthy drinks like water kefir and kombucha. 

Beter en Leuk: Beter en Leuk offers dishes that are not only vegan but also largely gluten-free. The emphasis is on homemade, pure food using organic, seasonal, and local ingredients. They also sell sustainable clothing and gifts.

Dignita Hoftuin: Dignita Hoftuin provides a social and sustainable brunch in the glass restaurant. Dignita is part of Not For Sale, an organisation that offers training programs to vulnerable target groups.

De Krat: De Krat sells sustainable, local, and fair meal boxes.

Fun

Shine Social Club: Shine Social Club is a free app for older adults (60+) to make new friends near them based on similar interests.

Women Skate the World: Women Skate the World is an organisation that uses skateboarding as a means to inspire, connect and empower people. The platform offers skate lessons with that little bit extra, aimed at personal development and community building, for children. Further, they organise meet-ups and workshops for LGBTQ+ and women, and advise and guide volunteers and other organisations in the field of urban sports.

Fun Forest: Fun Forest is a climbing experience in the forest. It allows family, friends, school, or work to be in contact with nature in an active and pleasant way.

Bloom & Growth: Bloom & Growth creates fertile ground for women who want to strengthen themselves, their environment, and neighbourhood.

The Pollinators: The Pollinators are a community and a platform that mainly focuses on supporting and connecting people and initiatives that protect and stimulate the pollinators and biodiversity.

DIYS Soap Stores: DIYS Soap Store sells natural and organic skin and hair care products. 

MIISHA Eco Shop: Miisha offers a wide range of sustainable items for the home to on the go from care products to children’s items. It also has ready-made gift sets with sustainable goodies.

Plastic Free Amsterdam: Plastic Free Amsterdam is a webshop with reusable and plastic-free products for your kitchen and bathroom, for personal care, and for the road.

The Flower Family: The Flower Family is an online flower service where users can order flowers once or as a subscription. The bouquets are designed with sustainably grown flowers. 

The Good Roll: The Good Roll makes 100 per cent tree-friendly and sustainable toilet paper from recycled paper, without chlorine, dyes, and fragrances. 

Kringloopwinkel RataPlan: Kringloopwinkel RataPlan is a thrift store that consists of a special blouse, a painting or a porcelain teacup, and more. RataPlan offers work to people with a great distance to the labour market.

Rederji Lampedusa:  Rederji Lampedusa offers a canal tour that also shares stories of immigrants from the past and present with you.

Beeldendge sproken: Beeldendge sproken is a gallery and art library where artists with a psychiatric background are supported. 

Recycle Fietsen: The platform sells sustainably recycled bicycles, restored old-timers, and products made from old bicycle parts. In the workshop, bicycles are repaired by skilled people with a distance to the labour market.

Stadsboerderij Osdorp: Stadsboerderij Osdorp is a petting zoo located in the middle of a residential neighbourhood in Osdorp. It’s home to donkeys, sheep, pigs, chickens, rabbits, and more and provides people with a disability or handicap full-time jobs taking care of the animals and maintaining the farm.  

I Amsterdam Store: The I Amsterdam Store at Central Station sells original gifts from Amsterdam entrepreneurs with a social touch. You will find everything from fashion accessories to interior items here.  

Kids

Sep7ember(kids): Sep7ember(kids) is a slow fashion label made of upcycled wool blankets and (vintage) deadstock fabrics.

Tiny Library: Tiny Library is a rental platform for baby products. By renting, parents save time, money, and up to 321 KG of CO2 per rented product.  

Circus: At Circos users can rent baby, children’s, and maternity clothes. When a piece of clothing is really used up, Circos makes new raw materials from it.

Billie Wonder: Billie Wonder wants to make washable diapers more accessible. Billie Wonder sells a selection of diapers that are easy to use and provides information about how washable diapers work. 

Design

The Good Gift Store: It is the first store exclusively dedicated to positive impact gifts. From upcycled bags and backpacks to recovered abandoned fishing nets from the ocean, everything in the store is fair trade, sustainable, or sustainably made. 

Nature Bar: Nature Bar is a soap and shampoo bar with a mission: to inspire people to take better care of themselves and nature. 

Roetz: In the Roetz Fair Factory, men and women make bicycles from old frames. Discarded bicycles are recoated and transformed into new design (e-)bikes.

Urban Nature Culture:  Urban Nature Culture offers a wide selection of innovative home deco products.

Reliving: Reliving is a marketplace for second-hand interior items with ease, reliability, and possible assistance with transport.

CRE8: CRE8 works on versatile and unique projects for clients from branding to product design to manufacturing. 

WAAR Haarlemmerdijk: WAAR Haarlemmerdijk is a department store with sustainable and fair trade gifts, including natural care products, ecological plants, reusable sandwich bags, recycled bags, and more. 

WAAR Van Woustraat: This store offers gifts that are fair trade, organic, recycled, and/or ecologically made. 

Het Faire Oosten: This departmental store consists of a range of responsible items made with passion: from hand-painted tableware from Tunisia and a sustainable fashion collection to rugs made of organic cotton and bags with a lining made from PET bottles from the ocean.