The Case of the Guyanan Weavers’ Cooperative

The Guyanan Weavers’ Cooperative is an organization founded by 300 women from the
Wapishana and Macushi tribes in Guyana, northern South America. The cooperative
revived the ancient art of hammock weaving using 19th century accounts and illustrations
of the hammocks made by European travelers and the cultivation of cotton on small family
plots and hand-weaving. The organization then hired someone to create a Web site,
which was instrumental in bringing their wares online. Not long after, in the mid-1990s, the
group of weavers (the Rupununi Weavers Society) was able to sell hammocks to Queen
Elizabeth, Prince Philip, the Smithsonian Institute, and the British Museum. Since 1998, they
have sold about 20 hammocks through the Internet at $1,000 per piece. This case also
shows that SMEs have great potential to compete in markets for high-end, bespoke
products despite the low sales volume