On this episode of the Lead With Purpose podcast host, Tze Ching Yeung talks to Chris Desai, an award winning CEO, philanthropist and entrepreneur who is highly experienced in sustainability in the fashion industry and runs an environmental charity.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Through working in music and fashion I ended up in fast fashion, which we all know is a massive polluter. 10 years into my career I started to see the amount of pollution we were causing and what we were doing to our planet and I though; enough’ s enough. I can’t say I love the planet and want to protect it whilst my industry is breaking the planet.
• I would click a button and order 400,000 T-shirts for the week. You don’t realise how much water, dye, polyester, plastic that uses. Then you think of the ethics of the working conditions in certain countries. The buying behaviours of people in the UK are causing a lot of these issues abroad. It’s so easy to press a button and alleviate the responsibility.
• I got to a point where I realised that my values of protecting the planet, looking after nature and my job were completely misaligned. I had an honest conversation with myself where I discovered I was a hypocrite; I’m not living what I believe. 90% of the world are also hypocrites, not living what they believe, their actions do not equate to what they believe.
• When I left that job I took six months out and spent it sailing, it wasn’t glamourous, it was damp and horrible, but it was at a time that I really needed to connect back to the planet and understand that I had a higher purpose and a better calling that just making money designing clothes. On that six-month journey at sea with no laptop or phone, meditating every day that I truly connected with myself and whether it made money or not I was going to live my purpose and have faith.

BEST MOMENTS

‘Not many people know that the textile industry is the second biggest polluter in the world.’

‘I walked out of the big London fashion firm that I worked for because I seemed to be the only one that could see that we were killing the planet.’

‘When you ask people: “If I gave you £1million what would you do?” It’s never what they’re doing right now.’

‘We are all human and all living on one planet. Conservation is a uniting factor that transcends all beliefs, gender, race, we’re all on this planet and we can all look after it.’

ABOUT THE GUEST

Chris Desai is an entrepreneur and philanthropist who set up The Vayyu Foundation in 2017, a registered charity that has made considerable contributions to the benefit and protection of the planet with its global projects UOCEAN 2050 and UEARTH 2050.

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ABOUT THE HOST

Tze Ching started her entrepreneurial journey back in 2007 with the launch of a sustainable clothing & home furnishing ecommerce business. Next, she created a sustainable fashion brand.

In 2019, she launched a social enterprise to help raise awareness about the negative impact of fashion at schools & colleges. 

Through the 15-year journey, she learned so much, but easily the most meaningful lesson learned was about the importance of marketing. She now focuses on channelling those insights to help others succeed through We Disrupt Agency, a business coaching, mentoring & digital marketing company. 

Tze Ching’s mission is to create a community of global change makers and to contribute to positive change in both people & planet.

CONTACT DETAILS

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