Sussan Outworkers' Stories

Winnie's* Story - making the Sussan Label

I came from China twelve years ago, and I have two children. Firstly I worked in a sweat shop and after I had my second child I started working from home.

At home, the boss just gives me overlocking work for part of the garment, so I don't make whole garments. Because of this I am not always busy as I have to wait for someone else to finish the rest of the garment. I only work about 6 hours a day. The boss gave me the machine to use, so I am not able to get other work from other contractors to increase my income. Even though the boss gave me the machine I have to pay for any repairs if it is broken.

I am very fast at sewing, but my rate of pay is still very low as the piece rate is low. I usually can get about $6 an hour. When I first started working at home I was actually getting $8-9 an hour because I was fast. The boss was surprised that I was so fast, so he reduced the rate he paid me for future orders of the same style.

Because my husband's income is very low it is not enough for our family to survive, so I must keep this job. Sometimes the sewing work gets busy with large, urgent orders, and then I don't have time to look after my children properly. At these times I get a lot of pain in my back and neck. There is also a lot of dust in the house from the material, so my children and I often get sick from this.

All these things make me really upset and I want to give up sewing, but I don't have any choice about getting another job. Even if I can only make $100 to $200 in a week that is very important income for my family.

The labels I make for include Sussan, Suzanne Gray and Sportsgirl. One of the dresses I made for Sussan I later saw in the shop for $50. I received $1 for doing the overlock sewing on that garment, which was about half the total sewing. In Sportsgirl I saw a top I had made selling for nearly $30 and I only received 60 cents per garment for overlocking, which was most of the sewing for that garment.

In addition to these low rates of pay, I did not receive any superannuation, holiday pay, sick pay, overtime pay and I am not covered for workers compensation.

I am telling my story because I want people to understand the outworkers situation and the bad conditions in which your clothes are made. I want the government to take steps to stop this exploitation. They must force the retailers to take responsibility for the clothes they sell. I don't want my children to experience the same injustice I have suffered.

Penny's Story

My name is Penny*. I live in St Johns Park, near Canley Vale, NSW. I came to Australia from Vietnam 2 years ago, and I've been an outworker since then.

In Vietnam, I worked as a designer and tailor, and I taught others how to sew. In Australia, the only work I've found is sewing clothes in my home. I work very long hours, starting early in the morning and finishing late at night.

In October, I sewed clothes with the Sussan label. I was given quite a difficult job sewing pants, which required a lot of skill and accuracy. My boss inspected my work to make sure all the measurements were just right. This was a requirement from Sussan that the work be accurate. If anything was incorrect, I had to do the whole item again. It took a long time to finish that order.

I was paid $2.10 for each pair of pants I sewed. Each pair of pants took around one and a half hours to complete. I kept a sample of those pants with the Sussan label and I still have them at home.

When I was doing my shopping recently, I went into a Sussan store and saw that the pants I sewed were selling for $50. I was shocked, and kept asking myself - why did I only get $2.10 when Sussan sells these pants for $50? How much profit do the middlemen and the retailers make from our work?

I stopped working for Sussan because I couldn't survive on these low rates of pay. I'm now 7 months pregnant and I have to think about how I will support my child. I can't look after my family unless I'm paid a proper amount. You can't raise a family working for Sussan.

* Not their real names