The Retail Sustainability Issue

The Fashion Industry Struggles with Sustainability Concerns

The fashion industry is an extraordinarily wasteful one. As of early 2017, the McKinsey Global Fashion Index named it as the second most polluting industry, only behind the oil industry.(1) Emissions pollutions from factories, water pollutants from the processing of fibers and garment manufacture, and production of artificial fibers are fashion’s greatest contributors to this issue. Per the EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, the fashion industry is responsible for 21 billion tons of waste in textile form.(1) There are a number of retailers attempting to create a more sustainable future in regard to production, fiber and fabric sourcing, human rights, and waste or potential reuse of textiles.

"This is not a philanthropic quest. We want to preserve our planet and do better for the people working in it." -Eva Kruse, President and CEO of Global Fashion Agenda

Younger consumers are more environmentally-conscious and thus demand the brands they purchase have greater sustainability practices. 66% of millennials are willing to spend more for sustainable brands based on the McKinsey Global Fashion Index.(1) Despite this, these customers are also budget-conscious and may not want to spend a lot of money to support these practices due to the expense to the brands. There are many ways for a brand today to show these efforts to the consumer through numerous volunteer reporting agencies to create a sustainable future and maintain transparency to the consumers they want to reach.





In March of this year, the Global Fashion Agenda – a non-profit sustainability forum – hosted the annual Copenhagen Fashion Summit. Prior to this, they created a new report called the CEO Agenda 2018 that detailed seven sustainability practices for the industry to address now. These seven were then split into three core priorities for immediate implementation and four transformational priorities for fundamental change. The core priorities include supply chain traceability and transparency through publicly identifying all vendors in a brand’s supply chain; efficient use of water, energy, and chemicals to reduce environmental impact; and respectful and secure work environments. The transformational priorities include creating a sustainable material mix to support the renewable nature of garments; developing a closed-loop fashion system using recyclable materials and reusing garments; promotion of better wage systems; and a fourth industrial revolution utilizing technology.(2)

"We are incredibly proud to be the leading luxury brand in the 2018 Dow Jones Sustainability Index. At Burberry, we are passionate about finding ways to be socially and environmentally responsible in everything we do, from investing in the communities at the heart of our business to creating innovative ways to tackle the most pressing issues faced by our industry." -Leanne Wood, Burberry's Chief People, Strategy and Corporate Affairs Officer

One brand leading the charge is Burberry. Burberry was named the leading luxury brand in the 2018 Dow Jones Sustainability Index.(3) This is despite the negative publicity the company received in response to the burning of 28 million pounds of its goods.(4) Luxury brands destroy unwanted goods in an attempt to maintain their pricepoint and place in the market versus holding clearance sales. Following the backlash, Burberry promised to end this practice and focus on better sustainability in the future. Previously, Burberry created policies to support these efforts such as initiatives put into place to invent new sustainable materials, use better sourcing practices, promote worker wellbeing, and achieve carbon neutrality.(3)





Eileen Fisher is another brand to spearhead the sustainability effort in the fashion industry. The company has worked toward a closed-loop fashion system for years. Eileen Fisher created new collections, Renew and Resewn, to recycle used garments for which they pay consumer $5.(5) For the Renew Collection, garments are collected at the company’s Tiny Factory in New York and resold at reduced prices or used to create new designs depending on their condition. For the Resewn Collection, the design team uses a felting machine to mesh new fabrics from unusable garments to create a patchwork fabric. This new fabric is then repurposed as new garments and housewares, such as pillows and wall hangings. Eileen Fisher’s Vision 2020 initiative leads the way in sustainability efforts fiber usage and creation, reducing toxins in the dyeing process, utilizing fewer resources to reduce pollution, invest in human rights with community outreach and fairness in wages, mapping their supply chain, and finally reusing and recycling materials.(6)

.

.

.

References:

(1) IFA Paris: Jean-Marc Chauve
(2) Business of Fashion: Tamison O'Connor
(3) Burberry
(4) Fashion United: Don-Alvin Adegeest
(5) Forbes: Barry Samaha
(6) Eileen Fisher: Vision 2020