The first day of 2023 was a record breaker.
Across Europe, many countries experienced their warmest-ever New Year’s Day, with pictures of Alpine ski slopes denuded of snow making headlines. In the US, a Christmas cold snap gave way to an unseasonably warm start to January in many states.
https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/sustainability/climate-change-weather-consumer-spending-seasonless/
Fashion brands and marketers have a new roadmap for sustainable transformation.
Incorporating buzzy practices, including regenerative agricultureand circularity, companies like Outerknown, J. Crew Group and VF Corporation are demonstrating the benefits of progress in several of the 12 areas of transformation laid out in a new report from Accenture.
But there’s a gulf between what the economic system incentivizes and what must happen to pull clothing manufacturing within the planetary boundaries.
https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/heres-how-marketers-accelerate-fashions-sustainable-transition/
One of fast fashion’s biggest players says it’s taking major steps toward a more sustainable business model. But in an industry predicated on low cost, low quality and high production volume, experts say it won’t be simple.
“It’s hard to see how they actually deliver on their emissions reductions targets,” said Ken Pucker, a professor at the Fletcher School at Tufts University in Medford, Mass., who focuses on sustainability.
“Because volumes are going to continue to go up.”
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/fast-fashion-sustainability-targets-1.6913112
With summer comes plastic–polyester dresses, synthetic bikinis, water bottles, and so on. I wonder how many of you are thinking about the repercussions of all of that. I know that today’s fashion motto is “circularity will save us all.” I embarked on a quest a couple of years ago in the form of a short documentary Fashionscapes: A Circular Economy, but I am sorry to break it to you: a recent conversation with former Timberland COO Ken Pucker (and his brilliant analysis in the Stanford Social Innovation Review, A Circle That Isn’t Easily Squared) posited fashion and circularity as an oxymoron.
https://en-vogue-me.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/en.vogue.me/fashion/holiday-wardrobe-fast-fashion-polyester-dress-livia-firth/amp/
Institutions across the globe have welcomed the ISSB’s much-anticipated inaugural global sustainability standards. However, some industry experts warn that too much focus on standardising data could distract from the urgent need to decarbonise.
https://www.energymonitor.ai/finance/reporting-and-disclosure/is-esg-investing-a-redundant-concept/
Last month, the European Parliament set out to ban environmental claims about carbon neutrality based on carbon offsetting schemes. This has caused ripple implications for sustainability and marketing teams, especially their public-facing approach on how to reach ‘net zero’.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/amynguyen/2023/06/16/carbon-neutral-claims-under-investigation-in-greenwashing-probe/?sh=2e710bfa6431
This month, three shirts, two dresses, and a pair of shorts arrived at my door. They’re mine, but only for a month. After that, I’ll pack them in a reusable tote bag and send them to a warehouse in Pennsylvania, where they’ll be cleaned and shipped to their next (temporary) owner.
Along with more than 150,000 other people—most of them, like me, women between the ages of 25 and 35—I subscribe to Nuuly, a rental service operated by URBN, the parent company of brands including Anthropologie, Free People, and Urban Outfitters. For just shy of $100 a month, I get a regular influx of new clothing—and a chance to clear my conscience.
https://time.com/6285257/is-clothing-rental-resale-recycling-sustainable-nuuly/
Asos has dropped its 2030 net-zero emissions target and Crocs has delayed its deadline by a decade, rare public resets as scrutiny of corporate climate goals mounts.
https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/sustainability/crocs-asos-net-zero-emissions-climate-targets-greenwashing/
Climate finance groups that press companies to decarbonize are wrongly confused as being regulators that set rules for businesses to reach net zero emissions, according to Dan Barclay, chief executive officer of BMO Capital Markets.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-04-25/climate-finance-groups-are-misunderstood-bmo-s-barclay-says?leadSource=uverify%20wall&sref=fnjoKOAK
https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/sustainability/rothys-bottle-bill-new-york-recycling/