Cattle Consumption Goes Down, Leather Prices Go Up

Breaking news: It should come as no surprise to Clearly Veg readers that supply and demand drastically affect the agriculture industry, but one that doesn’t seem to get much attention is the leather market. Bloomberg’s recent article, “Your Salad Lunches Are Killing American Leather” are a testament to the frailty of the long-standing system:

The article’s author, James Tarmy, introduces the reader to Lisa Howlett, owner of Auburn Leather, a 152 year-old company. Most of Tarmy’s narrative revolves around Auburn Leather’s current dliemmas – a leather shortage inspired by a cultural shift. While this is certainly bad news for Howlett, who has been forced to ensure that resources are used as efficiently as possible, something that was essentially unheard of in the company’s history, it continues a dialogue that Americans are having with long-standing American industries like agriculture, given a series of environmental and moral dilemmas that impose dramatic, fast-acting restrictions.

This isn’t the sort of breaking news that insists the veg community give business owners like Howlett a pat on the back for her efforts, noting that her business exists because, “those who make leather don’t want to be the bad guy…do you know where it [leather] would be if it wasn’t on my feet? In a landfill.” This is the sort of breaking news that serves to let the veg community know that we vote with our dollars day-in and day-out, and that this kind of dent in an animal product industry that has been around for thousands of year is proof-positive of a mission that can succeed and perhaps even eventually end animal suffering.

Click the link below for the full story.

Original article & image source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2015-05-27/your-salad-lunches-are-killing-american-leather