Kering Confirms Ban on Angora and Rabbit Felt After Talks With PETA
Luxury Group Marks Year of the Rabbit by Closing No-Fur Loophole
London – PETA is hopping for joy after luxury fashion group Kering – owner of Gucci, Saint Laurent, Balenciaga, and other brands – marked the Year of the Rabbit by confirming it has banned the use of angora and rabbit felt across all its brands. To celebrate this move, PETA France will be sending the company a rabbit-shaped vegan cake.
After introducing a ban on fur in 2021 that included rabbit fur, Kering had yet to implement a policy against angora and rabbit-fur derivatives. Kering brand Gucci banned angora in 2018 but sparked outrage by selling hats made from rabbit felt earlier this year. PETA US, a shareholder in the company since 2020, has now received confirmation stating, “Kering’s implementation of the no-fur ban has been explicitly reinforced internally to ensure that no rabbit hair or skin is used by our brands.”
“Angora and rabbit felt are torture for these sensitive animals, whose fur is either torn out while they’re still fully conscious or shorn off after they’ve been electrocuted or their necks have been broken,” says PETA Vice President of Corporate Projects Yvonne Taylor. “We applaud Kering’s compassionate decision and urge the last remaining brands that still sell angora to follow its lead.”
Investigations in Asia and Europe have revealed that rabbits used for angora are confined without enrichment or veterinary care. They are only let out to be subjected to violent plucking, during which they are tied up and held down and their soft hair is torn out by the fistful, sometimes tearing their delicate skin.
Rabbits farmed for their flesh and fur spend their brief, miserable lives in small, filthy cages, which inhibit their natural movements to such an extent that poor bone and muscle development leaves them unable to hop. When they reach slaughter size, workers break their necks or suffocate or electrocute them, sometimes failing to kill them and skinning them alive.
Kering joins a long list of more than 400 brands and retailers, including Armani, Burberry, Chloé, Calvin Klein, Dolce & Gabbana, Valentino, and Lacoste, which have committed to a ban on angora.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, or Instagram.
Contact:
Sascha Camilli +44 (0) 20 7923 6244; [email protected]
#