HEMPERDASHERY

Eco-friendly fashions growing Hemptown by 300% annually

When Jason Finnis was flogging his unique, home-sewn T-shirts to
summer fairs, folk festivals and flea markets around the Victoria area
about 10 years ago he never imagined where his modest cottage-industry
would lead him.

For one thing, he didn't expect that this mini-venture into capitalism
would quickly end his student days at the University of Victoria where
he was studying to become a music teacher.

But it did.

Nor did the 31-year-old realize that, a decade later, he would head a
vibrant young company with revenues growing at a 300-per-cent annual
pace and that expects to be listed on the Nasdaq Exchange by year-end.

He owes it all to his own entrepreneurial spirit and to hemp -- the
plant whose illegal cousin is marijuana.

Finnis runs Vancouver-based Hemptown Clothing Inc., manufacturer and
distributor of clothing throughout North America made from a blend of
55-per-cent hemp and 45-per-cent cotton.

With 12 full-time employees and a retail outlet at its 6,000-square
foot warehouse, the company specializes in promotional T-shirts and
caps, as well as retail T-shirts and Oxford shirts.

Hemptown's annual revenues are growing at a 300-per-cent pace, from
$195,000 in 2001 to $782,000 last year. They're expected to reach $3.2
million by the end of this year.

But this is a company whose culture is driven by environmental
stewardship as much as by revenues and profits. "We're a triple bottom
line company," Finnis says.

"We put profits, environment and human rights on the same
level."

Finnis explains that it takes 150 grams of pesticides and chemical
fertilizers to produce enough cotton for one shirt. In fact, he says
according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 10 per cent of
worldwide pesticides and 24 per cent of the world's insecticides are
used by the cotton industry.

"Hemp is a hardier crop so it doesn't require these chemicals to
thrive and it grows aggressively -- especially in northern climates,"
Finnis says.

The company uses the environmentally-attractive attributes of hemp
clothing as a very strong selling point to companies and other groups
and organizations which buy the promotional clothing.

"The environmental benefits of hemp are very important to our
corporate customers who spend money with us to promote themselves in
an eco-friendly way," he says. "Our products offer a front-line,
inexpensive way for corporations to promote themselves as being green."

Hemptown's promotional products include baseball caps and T-shirts.
Its long-list of clients includes the B.C. Lions Football Club, the
Government of Canada, Hyundai, Warner Bros., Vancouver Public Aquarium
and the University of California.

The fabric and clothing, which feels much like linen, is manufactured
in China in what Finnis quickly points out are "sweat-free shops," but
the company has plans to bring both its own hemp-growing and
manufacturing to Canada one day. "Ultimately, we'd like to be a
dirt-to-shirt company," Finnis says with a chuckle.

His company is also working towards technology that allows good
quality screen printing on 100-per-cent hemp cloth.

He started the company with fiancee Larisa Harrison in Victoria in a
basement suite. They imported the hemp cloth and jobbed-out the
clothes-making to home-sewers.

"I'd always wanted to run my own business even though I was planning
to become a music teacher," Finnis recalls. "And it was a magazine
article that put me on to the hemp-clothing idea."

Finnis also says the days when growing hemp was illegal because of its
close relationship with marijuana are long-gone.

"This simply isn't an issue anymore," he says. "Our customers take
this product because it's environmentally friendly. Comparing hemp to
marijuana is like comparing poppy seeds for bagels with opium."

Hemptown's application to list on the Nasdaq is now before the U.S.
Securities and Exchange Commission.

FIBREFILE

Hemp is a plant rooted in Biblical times and is grown for the very
strong fibre found in its woody stem.

For centuries hemp was used for ropes, sails and rough
cloths.

About four times stronger than cotton, hemp today is used in products
such as higher-quality cloths, edible oils, paper products and cosmetics.

For 60 years it was illegal to grow hemp in Canada.

But, in 1998, the federal government allowed registered commercial
growing of a strain of industrial hemp that has a low THC
(barbiturate) content. THC is the drug found in marijuana.