Bringing sustainable fashion forward
Fashion FWD is BESTSELLER’s ambitious new strategy that will make sustainability central to its way of doing business. BESTSELLER wants to do its part to transform the fashion industry for a sustainable future.
Fashion FWD is BESTSELLER’s ambitious new strategy that will make sustainability central to its way of doing business. BESTSELLER wants to do its part to transform the fashion industry for a sustainable future. It’s the right thing to do and it also makes good business sense.
Speeding up the transition
The fashion industry has a significant impact on the world around us. With our consumers and society in general expecting more from the fashion world, and an increasing acceptance of the gravity of climate change, fashion companies are faced with a new business reality.
‘Our strengths as a business are our agility and responsiveness to trends. We will apply these strengths to respond to the changing demands of our planet and society, and to speed up our transition to a more sustainable reality,’ says BESTSELLER CEO and owner Anders Holch Povlsen.
‘By preserving our climate, using resources efficiently and promoting human rights, business can be a positive force for change. We want to play a significant role in overcoming the biggest sustainability challenges and we see sustainability as a prerequisite for ongoing business success. Building on some good progress to date, we are now speeding up our efforts,’ he explains.
Launching towards our North Star
Fashion FWD emphasises the immediate need for inclusive and holistic action on sustainability across the value chain, and to guide the strategy BESTSELLER has formulated a North Star vision, describing the ultimate ambition and providing a constant sense of direction for the company.
‘Our North Star ambition commits us to bring fashion forward until we are climate positive, fair for all and circular by design,’ BESTSELLER’s Head of Corporate Affairs Dorthe Scherling Nielsen explains and elaborates:
‘Climate positive means that we will remove more emissions than we emit. Fair for all means that we will promote equality, dignity and safe working conditions for all, and circular by design means that we will turn waste into a valuable resource throughout our value chain.’
‘This is a significant moment for our company as we place sustainability at the core of our business. At the same time, we are fully aware of the magnitude of the challenge ahead. Without industry collaboration and the support of our business partners, we will not get there,” she adds.
The Fashion FWD strategy is based on becoming as sustainable as possible, as soon as possible, across four focus areas covering BESTSELLER’s value chain: Creating FWD, Making FWD, Engaging FWD and Delivering FWD. Each focus area is based on a vision for the future:
- Creating FWD is about working with innovative new fibres until everything that BESTSELLER creates is made exclusively using sustainable materials.
- Making FWD is about improving the environmental footprint of BESTSELLER’s products, supply chain and operations so they have a positive impact on the environment.
- Engaging FWD is an approach to truly embed human rights in the fashion industry, with a particular focus on the supply chain, while also providing BESTSELLER colleagues with a platform to unleash their potential.
- Delivering FWD is about a future circular model for fashion, where products and materials are ongoing resources.
Each of these focus areas include specific, measurable goals for the period of 2019-2025. When we have achieved these goals, we will then set new ones, always aiming higher towards our North Star.
Invest FWD – accelerating sustainable change
Invest FWD is BESTSELLER’s entrance into innovation for sustainability.
‘The objective of our new investment platform is to accelerate sustainable innovation and solutions throughout the whole life cycle of fashion. For example, we will invest in low-impact materials, new supply chain technologies and new business models,’ says Dorthe Scherling Nielsen and continues:
‘We know that we will only achieve our North Star through innovation, cooperation and by putting significant resources behind our efforts. That’s why we are launching Invest FWD.’
As part of Fashion FWD’s launch, we have selected three inaugural initiatives for Invest FWD. Invest FWD will continue to evolve over the coming years with new and exciting initiatives.
- BESTSELLER has become a partner in an organisation called Fashion for Good where it will work with major fashion companies to identify and cultivate the next generation of sustainable solutions.
- BESTSELLER has joined forces with a company called pond, which is working on a renewable bio-based alternative to polyester. Increasing the quality and availability of more sustainable fibres is one of the most substantial ways BESTSELLER can help change fashion’s environmental impact.
- Last but not least, BESTSELLER has set a goal to be powered by 100 percent renewable energy by 2021 in our owned and operated buildings globally. In 2019, we will unveil a project to get to 100 percent.
Read more at http://www.about.bestseller.com/sustainability
