The kitchen table - many of the world's best ideas are fostered around this raised piece of wood. No Sweat Apparel, also known as Bienestar International, began as a enterprise concept in January of 2000, conceived by Natalia Muina and Adam Neiman in their kitchen.

Working as a Chinese medicine practitioner and a roofing company founder, Natalia and Adam didn't have much experience with the clothing industry, but that didn't stop them from wanting to make a difference. "We differentiated our product just by being different, and that was enough. I experienced the pleasure of taking market share from well established outfits by doing nothing more complicated than trying to treat everyone the way I would want to be treated. And I began to wonder if this notion could have broader applications. Bienestar International is my answer to that question," says Adam, the company's President and CEO.

The concept behind the brand is quite simple: function as an open source, sweatshop free, union made apparel company.

We are the first - we think, the first of many - apparel maker to go open source. We will tell you about our sources, highlight them, show them off. The workers who make our clothes will have living wages and decent working conditions; they will have unions. Will that lead our competition to the same shops? Excellent. We want our sources to thrive. That's the whole point. Or a good part of it, anyway. The other part of open source apparel making is a challenge to our competitors: let them, too, reveal their sources. Let them suffer shame and loss of revenue for favoring sweatshops. Let them reap the rewards of choosing union shops and respecting workers rights.

The previous quote is taken from the company's website, serving as a perfect, direct explanation of the brand's goals and benefits to the industry as a whole. As expected, this open source model has garnered the brand a due amount of attention from the media, including the New York Times, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, and al Jazeera TV. Celebrity support has come from a number of unique sources as well, from a Nobel Peace Prize winner and Oscar winning screenwriter to a British folk singer, all of which are highlight on the company's "News" page.

So, what are the items really like? Wonderful, of course! Happy people make quality, long-lasting garments that you can appreciate. Though the company is only using a limited amount of sustainable fibers (read more about why here), your dollars do have an impact on the quality of life for their workers around the world. Also, 7.5% of the businesses' pretax profit is donated to anti-sweatshop organizations and union organizing funds in developing countries. Tess and tanks (both blank and with logos), hats, work apparel, sweats, athletic wear, and more are available for men, women, and children. The company's most popular item is their footwear collection, ranging from $40-55 a pair.