Clothing company reaches hand out to 'untouchables'

Manufacturing gives women opportunity to better their lives

By Joyzelle Davis, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published October 1, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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Photo by Ken Papaleo / The Rocky

Susan Kiely, left, tries an outfit on Fay Washington recently. Kiely's company, Women With a Cause, employs seamstresses in India to produce her SK Designs clothing. The jackets are made from patterned Indian silk cloth.

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In 2005, Susan Kiely heard about the plight of Third World women at the World Vision AIDS Day conference and resolved that she needed to do something to help.

Kiely struck upon the idea of designing clothing that would be manufactured by India's Dalit - or "untouchable" - lower-caste women who had never had the opportunity to be employed - much less learn a marketable skill like sewing.

Three years and seven trips to India later, her company, Women With a Cause, formally launched last week with a fashion show at Coors Field. The show highlighted the company's line of special- occasion jackets under her SK Designs label.

The seamstresses, meanwhile, have been able to move out of the areas where they had been living and get their kids into school with the wages they've earned, said Kiely, wife of MillerCoors CEO Leo Kiely.

Women With a Cause built an economic training center in Hyderabad, India, where a team of six seamstresses currently produces her SK Designs clothing. The $250 to $500 Western-style jackets, made from vibrantly patterned Indian silk cloth, were designed with women over 45 in mind, Kiely said.

Kiely hopes to use Women With a Cause as a platform to help women around the world. She's also starting lines of computer cases, jewelry bags and other accessories handmade by women in Thailand who have been rescued from human trafficking, and is starting a line of embroidered nurses scrubs made in Burma.

Despite its philanthropic mission, Women With a Cause isn't taking the traditional nonprofit route. The company will give a portion of the proceeds from the Sept. 24 show to its Indian partner, Operation Mercy Charitable Co. But Kiely, 61, plans to run Women With a Cause as a for-profit business with the intention of eventually selling it and then giving the proceeds to charity.

Women With a Cause is the latest venture for Kiely, who most recently worked as a chaplain for inner-city senior citizens. She jokingly credits her experience as a "clotheshorse" for her fashion design inspiration, although she previously managed a clothing showroom and has a background in interior design.

Her three-year experience starting Women With a Cause was truly "women helping women," Kiely said, from friends traveling to India to instruct women to sew to a marketing expert teaching her how to run focus groups. The men chipped in, too, with a marketing professor friend assigning his class to study the concept, and husband Leo serving as "my financial backbone," she said.

All of the products will be sold only at home shows for now. Eventually, Kiely hopes to sell products online and in retail locations as well.

"I want the women who buy these products to really understand our mission," she said.

Women With a Cause

* What they do: Started by Susan Kiely, the company teaches women in India's Dalit - or "untouchable" - caste to sew. The Indian women sew jackets designed by Kiely, created with women over 45 in mind. The jackets, which range from $250 to $500, are Western-style and are made of Indian silk patterns.

* What they offer: Women With a Cause also sells purses, computer bags and other accessories made by women in Thailand coming out of human trafficking, as well as embroidered nurses scrubs made in Burma.

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