Colleges shed Russell Athletic

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – It’s wall-to-wall “Veritas” at the Coop, the Harvard Square landmark with an entire floor devoted to T-shirts and sweatshirts, hats and scarves, jackets and boxer shorts with the school’s name and insignia.

They sell clothes for the law school, the business school, even down-river rival MIT. Most of Harvard’s athletic teams are represented.

Yet nothing there is made by Russell Athletic.

Joining a growing number of U.S. schools, Harvard severed ties with Russell after two watchdog groups said the Atlanta-based clothing-maker harassed pro-union Honduran employees.

According to the Workers Rights Consortium, a group that monitors labor conditions abroad for colleges, Russell spent two years trying to intimidate workers who attempted to unionize before closing the factory when they did.

“They’re well on their way to being the first company in history to be kicked out of collegiate sports because of their labor practices,” said Scott Nova, the executive director of the WRC. “I can’t imagine their affiliates will be too happy about that, which includes the NBA and the NFL and others.”

Russell says it announced the closure of the factory last October because of falling demand for the fleece sewn there. The company said it picked the union plant in Choloma because it had a month-to-month lease and cost $2 million less to close than the non-union alternative.

The company said that earlier anti-union actions, including the firing of 145 workers detailed in reports by the WRC and the industry-sponsored Fair Labor Association, were taken by local management. Russell is taking steps to fix such problems, company officials said.

“We acknowledge that management mistakes were made,” said Matt Murphy, a senior vice president in charge of licensing. “We will ultimately prove that Russell Athletic is sincere in its approach … and that these schools will see that and want to become partners with us again. We will need to give them a reason to do that.”

So far, the pledge has failed to persuade administrators not only at Harvard, a school sometimes derided as “Moscow on the Charles” for its liberal slant, but at Montana and Montana State, at five Big Ten universities and at least eight of the 64 schools playing in the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

Eighteen major universities of the 186 colleges affiliated with the WRC have dropped Russell as a licensee. In announcing its decision, Cornell cited WRC and FLA reports that “concluded that the closing of the factory… which was described by Russell as an economic decision, was also due in part to anti-union animus.”

“Cornell is committed to respecting the rights of workers around the world and we expect the companies that are licensed to produce Cornell apparel to share that commitment,” said Mike Powers, director of operations for Cornell University Communications. “Russell’s actions in this case are a clear violation of the codes of conduct that Cornell licensees agree to follow.”

Licensing deals allow manufacturers to print clothing with colleges’ trademarks. The value to the school depends on whether it’s a few hats or an entire clothing line, but Cornell spokesman Simeon Moss said sales of Russell gear on the Ithaca, N.Y., campus totaled about $500,000 per year. The school collects about 8 percent as a licensing fee.

Murphy declined to comment on how much the lost licenses would cost the company, a subsidiary of Fruit of the Loom Inc., owned by Berkshire Hathaway Inc.