WEBVTT - Why Does Cashmere Cost So Much?

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works. Hey, brain Stuff.

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<v Speaker 1>I'm Lauren Vogelbaum. And if you were to ask Windy Paia,

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<v Speaker 1>a goat farmer in bread and Maine, to name what

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<v Speaker 1>she likes most about her work, she'll tell you it's

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<v Speaker 1>the individual personalities of the goats for which she cares.

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<v Speaker 1>She said, I think of the word capacious, that comes

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<v Speaker 1>from the word caprine, which is Latin for goat. They're

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<v Speaker 1>like that. They'll jump and dance, and they'll climb on anything.

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<v Speaker 1>They're affectionate, pious. Particular type of goats, forty to eighty

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<v Speaker 1>of them, depending on the year, are also some of

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<v Speaker 1>the providers of a valuable product for humans, kashmere. Yes,

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<v Speaker 1>in case you didn't know, your favorite, softest and probably

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<v Speaker 1>most expensive sweater comes from the fur of the kashmere goat.

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<v Speaker 1>And once you know what's involved in making a kashmere sweater,

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<v Speaker 1>the price might not seem so exorbitant. The goats are

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<v Speaker 1>one of at least eleven wool producing animals. The list

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<v Speaker 1>also includes sheep, rabbits, and lama. There are several varieties

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<v Speaker 1>of kashmere goat goats, and a number of farms, factories,

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<v Speaker 1>and conglomerates around the world using various production methods to

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<v Speaker 1>make kashmere. The first goats purported to be used by

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<v Speaker 1>humans to produce fabric to keep warm are said to

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<v Speaker 1>be the Pashima goats. They're found in the super high

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<v Speaker 1>altitude regions of western and northern Tibet. The goats soft

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<v Speaker 1>and dense under fur is built to withstand extreme temperatures

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<v Speaker 1>as low as negative forty degrees fahrenheit or celsius. The

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<v Speaker 1>wolf from these bucks and Nanni's, favored by British Royalty,

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<v Speaker 1>eventually came to be processed in Kashmir in northern India,

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<v Speaker 1>hence the name. Various bloodlines of Kashmir goats have, with

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<v Speaker 1>human help, spread around the world. Australia has a particular

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<v Speaker 1>breed that provides luxuriously soft threads, and North American kashmere

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<v Speaker 1>goats are found in the colder regions of the U

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<v Speaker 1>s and Canada. North America is where Paya and her

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<v Speaker 1>husband Peter Gough come in. They have run Springtide Farm

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<v Speaker 1>since n Pia eleven goats for his birthday, in part

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<v Speaker 1>to help clear their farmland. It has a learning experience

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<v Speaker 1>since then. Pia estimates that Springtide is one of two

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<v Speaker 1>hundred to three hundred kashmere goat farms in North America.

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<v Speaker 1>Most cashmere goat farms in the US are small in size,

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<v Speaker 1>less than sixty goats, says Paya, who is also the

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<v Speaker 1>president of the Kashmere Goat Association, a nonprofit whose website

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<v Speaker 1>claims it brings together breeders, fiber artists, and others interested

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<v Speaker 1>in these charming animals and the fiber they grow in

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<v Speaker 1>March and April. You know, early spring is when the

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<v Speaker 1>goats start to naturally shed their winter wool and when

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<v Speaker 1>production begins on the farms. A few US farms share

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<v Speaker 1>these kashmere goats, though because of production loss and the

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<v Speaker 1>high cost to weed out the valuable downy undercoat. Instead,

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<v Speaker 1>most facilities hand comb the wool. That means workers often

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<v Speaker 1>the farm owners themselves, set with each animal and slowly

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<v Speaker 1>tease out the fur that creates the fine wool for

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<v Speaker 1>cashmere with a dog rake up to an hour and

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<v Speaker 1>a half per goat. Paia explained, when you look at

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<v Speaker 1>these goats, you see the long draping fur that's the

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<v Speaker 1>guard hair. The cashmere hair is under that. The crimp

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<v Speaker 1>in cashmere is three dimensional, and that's part of what

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<v Speaker 1>makes cashmir so incredibly soft. An average goat provides just

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<v Speaker 1>three to four ounces of cashmere that's about grams. That

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<v Speaker 1>means it typically takes about six goats to make enough

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<v Speaker 1>fiber for just one cashmere sweater. Once the kashmere fur

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<v Speaker 1>is separated, samples of it are sent for quality testing

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<v Speaker 1>to one of two labs in the US, one in Texas,

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<v Speaker 1>one in Colorado. Most legitimate US cashmere farmers have made

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<v Speaker 1>a commitment to provide only high quality fiber, outlined in

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<v Speaker 1>the Kashmir Goat Association standards and backed by organizations like

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<v Speaker 1>the Kashmere and Camel Hair Manufacturers Institute. That means consistency

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<v Speaker 1>or uniformity in the fiber. Each follicle should be at

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<v Speaker 1>least one point to five inches that's three point two

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<v Speaker 1>centimeters in length and its relaxed or unstretched state, and

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<v Speaker 1>no bigger than nineteen microns in diameter. If wearing wool

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<v Speaker 1>make you itch, that's actually because the wolf fibers have

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<v Speaker 1>an uneven thickness. The standard thickness of wool is twenty

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<v Speaker 1>eight microns. Cashmere is much finer that standard, of less

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<v Speaker 1>than nineteen microns, is why kashmere can feel less scratchy.

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<v Speaker 1>Cashmere that fails to beat these standards inevitably creates quality

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<v Speaker 1>problems like pilling in the final product, and there are

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<v Speaker 1>plenty of examples of bad cashmere out there. While the

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<v Speaker 1>Federal Trade Commission enforces the Wool Product Labeling Act in

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<v Speaker 1>the United States, it gets murky on the international market.

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<v Speaker 1>Even the FTC says quote routine testing of fiber contents

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<v Speaker 1>by a qualified, independent testing lab is the best way

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<v Speaker 1>to assure accurate labels, and that means it's hard for

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<v Speaker 1>consumers to determine where the cashmere they're buying comes from

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<v Speaker 1>and specifically how the goats are treated. Kashmere demand is

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<v Speaker 1>one of the problems. It reportedly far exceeds how much

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<v Speaker 1>goats can produce every year. That means that less scrupulous

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<v Speaker 1>producers may turn to inhumane methods to produce more wool

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<v Speaker 1>for lesser operating costs. The organization PET has accused Chinese

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<v Speaker 1>conglomerates of shearing the goats midwinter, when the animals need

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<v Speaker 1>the fur to keep warm. A pious says that some farms,

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<v Speaker 1>to save production costs, have even experimented with restricting goats diets,

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<v Speaker 1>But aside from compromising the animal's health, it also directly

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<v Speaker 1>affects the quality of the cashmere. She said, if you

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<v Speaker 1>starve your animals, the hair will get finer and shorter

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<v Speaker 1>and more brittle. You can't spin it. They call it

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<v Speaker 1>hunger fine. So if you wear cashmere, Paia recommends buying

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<v Speaker 1>directly from the source or choosing very carefully. Cash Beer

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<v Speaker 1>will consist of about one percent of a goats total

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<v Speaker 1>woolf production for apparel, so the fabric and those sweaters

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<v Speaker 1>should have a price to reflect this scarcity. But even

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<v Speaker 1>for farmers like Paia, who sells her cashmere online and

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<v Speaker 1>at fairs and festivals, it's difficult to tell if it's

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<v Speaker 1>the real deal. Paya herself has been fooled. She recalls

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<v Speaker 1>a time when she found a cashmere sweater at a

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<v Speaker 1>store for less than a hundred dollars. She bought it.

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<v Speaker 1>It turned out to be a crylic. Another time, she

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<v Speaker 1>and her husband were visited by a group of people

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<v Speaker 1>who said they were interested in getting into the Kashmir industry.

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<v Speaker 1>They brought with them samples of Kashmir they had bought

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<v Speaker 1>a trade shows in Italy. Pia recalls they had this

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<v Speaker 1>one shawl. It was shiny, and Kashmir isn't shiny, so

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<v Speaker 1>we had to say to them, you know, this is

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<v Speaker 1>really nice. I don't know what it is, but it's

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<v Speaker 1>not Kashmir. Today's episode was written by Jamie Allen and

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<v Speaker 1>produced by Tyler Clang for iHeart Media and How Stuff Works.

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<v Speaker 1>To learn more about Kashmir with a K, check out

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<v Speaker 1>our patriot podcast Dressed the History of Fashion. They've got

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<v Speaker 1>an episode all about it called Kashmir with a K,

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<v Speaker 1>The Controversial History of a Shawl, And of course from

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<v Speaker 1>more on this and lots of other fine topics, visit

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<v Speaker 1>our home planet, how Stuff Works dot com