Veteran Voices

VOICES OF THE PATHFINDERS

Today, it feels like everyone is talking about sustainability. Suston presents four industry pioneers who have been doing this long before people were ready to listen.

THE VIGILANTE

Kris Tompkins has combined sharp business acumen, out-of-the-box thinking, and a rebel spirit to conserve over 57,000 square kilometers in Patagonia and Chile over the past quarter century.

BY COREY BUHAY PHOTO TOMPKINS CONSERVATION

Like many millionaires, Kris Tompkins has spent the past 27 years buying land. Unlike most millionaires, however, she has given away almost every acre she has bought. Tompkins Conservation is best known for purchasing over 4,000 square kilometers of Chilean land, only to rewild it and gift it to the Chilean government for conservation in 2018. At the time, that kind of private gift was unheard of.

Fortunately, Kris was no stranger to rebel environmentalism when she joined Tompkins Conservation in 1993; she got her start at Patagonia where she served as CEO for 20 years, helping turn the then scrappy startup into an icon for both outdoor style and environmental advocacy.

Patagonia’s journey started small. In 1985, the brand donated one percent of its net sales to grassroots environmental groups, a move Kris calls one of the most important sustainability steps Patagonia took during her term as CEO. “Helping people protect their own backyards was a start to Patagonia making a difference on a larger scale,” she explains.

The success of that program, and the passionate environmentalism of Yvon and Melinda Chouinard, inspired Kris.

“I began to understand what was going on in a much broader landscape called the planet, and that was through working for the Chouinards all those years,” she says. Kris credits her nonprofit’s success to hard work and collaboration.

“It’s vital to work with local communities and governments to make sure that they are on board as stakeholders,” she explains.

In Chile, locals were initially suspicious of the expats’ motives. So, the Tompkinses hired local biologists and ranchers as land managers, and started working to improve infrastructure in nearby villages. Eventually, locals warmed to the idea, and Tompkins Conservation struck a deal with the Chilean government to match its land donations at a ratio of 9 to 1.

Think big, act now In 2015, Doug passed away while kayaking with friends. Kris continued working with their projects. Today, she says the achievements of Tompkins Conservation was made possible by Doug’s vision. “He was a person of big ideas which require a certain leap of faith to implement. He always said, ‘Commit, and then figure it out.’”

It’s that daring and willingness to adopt creative solutions—like buying land outright—that has allowed the organization to accomplish so much, even with the climate clock ticking, Kris says:

“If you care at all about the future, act. Who-ever you are, wherever you live, you have to wake up in the morning and do something for the causes you believe in.”

Companions in conservation Around the time she retired from Patagonia in 1993, Kris had begun making trips with her husband Doug Tompkins, co-founder of The North Face, to southern Chile. They fell in love with the area’s raw, untouched landscapes. She and Doug moved there, and immediately set to work buying land to protect it from ranching and logging. To date, Tompkins Conservation has helped conserve over 57,000 square kilometers – an area about the size of Croatia.

PHOTO: TOMPKINS CONSERVATION KRIS TOMPKINS Occupation: President of Tompkins Conservation, United Nations Patron of Protected Areas Age: 69 Residence: Santa Paula, California More info: tompkins conservation.org

Together with her husband Doug, Kris Tompkins fell in love with the rough, southern parts of South America.

THE STORYTELLER

If you want to sell to environmental sceptics, you have to have both a good product and know how to talk about it. Nick Brown has made a career of doing exactly that.

BY COREY BUHAY PHOTO STÉPHANE ROBIN

NICK BROWN Occupation: Founder and Owner of Nikwax Age: 65 Residence: Ticehurst, England, UK More info: nikwax.com

Years of trekking gave Nick Brown many opportunities to test the company’s products.

Nikwax founder Nick Brown has always been a smooth talker. But he admits that in the beginning, he wasn’t necessarily putting that gift to use for the environment. “To be honest, the first sustainability aspect on my mind was sustaining myself,” he laughs.

Nick had always been interested in science, but when he went to university he ultimately chose a degree in social anthropology.

“When I graduated, I was very poor and very unemployable,” he says.

Fortunately, he possessed a secret recipe for a waterproof boot wax, which he’d perfected during years of trekking through the English countryside. When an outdoor shop asked 22-year-old Nick to make them some in 1977, Nikwax was born. Within a few years, Nikwax’s product line had expanded to include sprayable waterproofing for apparel. Nick, who’d always considered himself an environmentalist, immediately chose to use plastic spray bottles in lieu of CFC-spewing aerosol cannisters. “But I knew if we could use water-based solvents, consumers would be able to put the garment in a washing machine. That would mean no sprayer at all, so less packaging and a more effective application.”

This would mean a huge shift for Nikwax’s consumer base, but if anyone could get them on board, it was Nick.

“Quite early on, I realized that communicating to our consumers was really important, and we became quite good at that,” Nick explains.

Making chemistry understandable He was able to combine his extensive scientific literacy—gained from regularly reading science magazines “cover-to-cover”—with his gift of gab to successfully communicate his environmental values to Nikwax customers. That talent has been crucial to the brand’s success.

“At the end of it, most Nikwax products are white liquids, and the consumer can’t see the huge amount of work and testing that’s gone into producing those white liquids. If you’re not prepared to tell the story of it to your consumers, you’re not going to get very far,” Nick says.

In the end, consumers reacted positively to the new wash-in waterproofing. And retailers, initially hesitant to adopt the new product, relented after noticing the increased demand that Nick had helped cultivate.

The campaign was a success, but stories about CEOs pushing hard to make environmentallyfriendly products work are far from the norm. Nick speculates that, for many brands, it’s because the unspoken goal is more about gaining positive PR than saving the planet. The antidote? Nick recommends bringing corporate social responsibility personnel and scientific advisors up to the director level, ensuring the C-suite remains educated about what matters.

Nick also urges companies to take a leap with new products, as Nikwax did with its wash-in waterproofing in the 1980s.

“Even now, what’s driving consumers isn’t the environmental thing. It’s product performance,” Nick says.

To do good, brands have to make a product that’s both environmentally friendly, and better than anything else out there.

“If you want to make a change, you have to have some pain in the beginning,” Nick says. “It requires commitment.”

THE GARDENER

Many say that the suppliers of hard goods need to step up when it comes to sustainability. But Jake Lah could claim that his company DAC started doing this over 30 years ago, in South Korea.

BY GABRIEL ARTHUR PHOTO STÉPHANE ROBIN

“I just wanted to protect my people and create a more green atmosphere for them.” If you ask Jake Lah, CEO and founder, this is the down-to-earth reason why DAC today is one of the pioneering companies within the hard goods segment of the outdoor industry. The Korean manufacturer of aluminum tubes has around 130 employees and is providing brands like Vaude, Hilleberg and Marmot with poles for their tents. The head office and factory are still based in Incheon, South Korea, where Jake started DAC in 1988.

“Like at most industrial sites, the surroundings were all grey, with no nature in sight. To start with, I made a small garden outside the factory and planted five apple trees. At the beginning, the few employees I had didn’t understand why. But they soon began to appreciate it.”

More trees and flowers were planted. But Jake soon realized that the interiors of the factory also needed to become much better, if his people, as he calls the company employees, would feel good at work.

“In the early nineties, making aluminum poles was a dirty process,” Jake recalls.

The factory floor was greasy with oil that was dripping from pipes, and yellowish fumes rose from the boiling tanks used to make the aluminum surface bright. Jake was still fighting to make the company profitable, and his employees volunteered to help making their workspace cleaner.

“They were fantastic. We were searching for every source of leakage of fluids and dirt. After three years, it was so clean that we could have lunch together on the factory floor.”

The next project took eight years: to protect the workforce from the risk of toxic air. At the time, there were no better methods available. So Jake and his team set out to invent their own processes. After a long period of trial and error, DAC found a way to eliminate nitric acid and phosphoric acid from their anodizing process. Also, the cleaning solutions before the heat treatment were radically improved.

“When the air inside our factory got so much better, it was such a relief,” says Jake.

Before their time This methodical way of cleaning up every step of the production led to DAC becoming a stateof-the-art business around fifteen years ago with respect to sustainability in its segment. But the problem was that hardly anyone outside the company was interested. Compared to other industries, most outdoor companies were rather late to start working systematically with their supply chains. And when they started, the focus was – and still is – mainly on textile production.

“Some of our clients like REI, Hilleberg and Vaude, really appreciated what we were doing. But we could for instance not be certified by Bluesign, since they were only looking at chemical management in the textile industry.”

And perhaps Jake’s rather humble way of communicating is another reason that DAC’s efforts still today are not so well known.

“We concentrate on our work instead of going out and shout about it.”

When DAC soon opens another manufacturing site in Vietman, they will bring this philosophy with them. The water coming out of the factory’s sewage system will be drinkable and trees, plants and flowers will surround all buildings.

JAKE LAH Occupation: CEO and Founder of DAC. Age: 65 Residence: Incheon, South Korea More info: dacpole.com

Jake Lah and fellow students at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, USA.

THE STRATEGIST

From calling up mill owners to explain sustainability, to piloting global strategy for the Textile Exchange, Karla Magruder has spent over 30 years shaping the textile industry into a force for good.

BY COREY BUHAY PHOTO FABRIKOLOGY

KARLA MAGRUDER Occupation: Textile consultant, founder of Fabrikology International, Textile Exchange board member Age: 60 Residence: Campbell Hall, New York, USA, and Milan, Italy More info: Fabrikology.com

Karla Magruder visiting silk and garment factories in the Liaoning province in China back in the days.

Textiles and apparel make up $3 trillion in global business. Some see the industry as a huge source of global greenhouse gas emissions, chemical pollution and waste. Karla Magruder sees it as an opportunity.

“Raw material choices have significant environmental impacts,” Karla explains.

That’s why convincing companies to choose the right ones can make a big difference. According to one study, for example, simply swapping virgin polyester for recycled polyester in manufacturing uses nearly two-thirds less energy and emits a third less carbon dioxide.

With that in mind, Karla is doing her best to pilot the textile industry juggernaut toward sustainability. But maintaining her heading hasn’t always been easy.

In the late 1990s, Karla was almost a decade into a promising career as a textiles sales manager when she grew seriously ill. Worried she might never get another chance, she left her U.S. job to move to Italy, something she’d always wanted to do. She was quickly blown away by how progressive the Italians were.

“They were already charging for bags at the grocery store, and you had to recycle everything or you were fined,” Karla recalls.

In 2003, Karla founded the renewable textile consulting company Fabrikology International—

finding herself a little fish in a big, skeptical sea. During early conversations with brands, retailers, and mills, Karla recalls needing to define sustainability with them.

“It wasn’t even on people’s radar,” she says.

Fact-based consultancy Fabrikology’s early days involved a lot of educating. Karla found the most effective strategy was simply to present the science and to have enough facts and data to back up every claim she made. Even now, she says sharing articles or highlighting what others in the industry are doing is the best way to change someone’s mind about the importance of sustainability.

“You can’t unlearn something once you learn it. Knowledge has an effect on people, even if it takes time.”

Her patient approach worked. The word of Fabrikology’s services began to spread, and clients started to trickle in. The only thing she wishes she’d done differently?

“When you’re just starting out, you tend to soften things. I wish we’d stuck to our beliefs and been more bold, taking a firmer stance on what needed to be done,” she says.

“I’ve also learned that one of the best things you can do is to create your own projects.”

Today, Karla runs Fabrikology, consults regularly, speaks at trade shows and event panels, and guides global textile industry strategy as a board member of the Textile Exchange. She’s pushing sustainability from the top down and the bottom up, but she’s always the first to say that it’s not enough. Right now, Karla believes that companies are interested in the ROI of sustainability, but don’t look much further. They fail to expand their view to the long-term health of their partners, communities and the planet.

“I don’t think we have a business model today that will allow the changes we need,” she says, and continues:

“But it is coming. We just don’t know what it looks like yet.”

Foreseeing the turn of the tide, Bluesign has been developing solutions to environmental and social problems in the supply chain 20 years before the industry even knew they had them. Ahead of its Time

Alot has happened in the last 20 years. The last Volkswagen Beetle rolled through production. Redbull dropped a man from the stratosphere. Steve Jobs unveiled the first iPod, followed by the iPhone. Facebook launched its social platform. The last 20 years were witness to technologies that changed communication and information sharing as we know it today.

However, there is a general consensus that not enough has happened to move the textile and fashion industry into the environmentally and socially

responsible position that has increasingly been demanded for by consumers. The new trending discussion topic is radical transparency. The current industry demands are pushing players to implement sustainability policy reaching throughout their supply chain, while increasing traceability, transparency, and accountability.

Brands especially find themselves under pressure to provide more information about their products and the product manufacturing process. Moreover, certification institutions are finding they have to move quickly to improve the systems they have in place to meet the industry needs in order to provide this increased transparency.

Transparency is a competitive edge A 2019 report produced by Suston Magazine demonstrated that no retailer ranked itself an expert in materials sustainability. How can brands then be expected to develop and implement the sustainability initiatives they are promising consumers?

The challenges that the industry is currently facing are multifaceted: Fast-fashion has taken over the industry by storm

and is the only segment of the fashion industry that has experienced market growth in the past 15 years. Now, many established luxury brands want to speed up their production and reaction time just to remain competitive against the fast-fashion wave.

While data transparency can appear to be a challenge for the industry, in the current global climate where data is king, transparency throughout the supply chain can instead offer a competitive advantage for a company. In our globalized world, “out of sight, out of mind” no longer exists. Information will always find its way to the surface.

As consumers take stock of their global footprint, they will make active decisions to seek out information in order to increase their positive influence and reduce negative impacts on the environment and society.

20 years ahead of the game For the last 20 years, Bluesign has been advocating for and developing solutions to meet this demand; long before the consumer demand was perceived by the industry. Today, the Bluesign benchmark is the most efficient way to guarantee compliance with new regulations, without compromising on functionality, quality, or design.

THE BLUE WAY path paved by Bluesign for the past 20 years has encompassed these chemical and environmental topics before they became trending topics in the textile or fashion industries. While many organizations are now recognizing a need to react, Bluesign has been acting 20 years ahead of time. Bluesign, its extensive expert base, experience, and partners, have created a stable solution that combines sustainable practices with solutions that provide the industry with economic benefits. This holistic approach encompasses the needs throughout the value chain and the end-user.

What sets the Bluesign approach apart from other systems is its Input Stream Management. Previous solutions tested a finished product and allowed for little flexibility if standards were not met. 20 years ago, Bluesign’s Input Stream Management was a revolutionary idea and a first mover towards an industry mindset shift; shifting away from testing

a finished end product, to setting criteria along the way for components and processes. The Bluesign Input Stream Management has created a sleek and efficient assessment process, one where the globally accepted standards are integrated in determining a product’s compatibility with the Bluesign and the industry benchmark.

This scientific systematic approach established Bluesign as the industry leader for chemical verification, sustainability, and conscious production practices in the textile industry. Today, the idea of a transparent supply chain is moving towards the norm. However, with processes and supply chain transparency comes the need for industry tools to simplify the communication and collaboration along the many horizontal and vertical levels of the supply chain.

First mover advantage The bluesign ® CUBE is a web-based platform with Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) capabilities. The primary and paramount feature of the bluesign ® CUBE is its efficient facilitation of transparent information flow between connected organizations.

In line with the long established Bluesign Input Stream Management mindset, when organizations are able to keep track of their production input usage, they will be able to measure and understand their output. This software suite and measurement tool can generate Environmental Key Performance Indicators (eKPIs) which are of unparalleled value in creating reports for shareholders, stakeholders, and consumers. Data measures in reduction of emissions, discharge, and increases in The bluesign® CUBE is a web-based platform facilitating efficient transparent information flow between connected organizations.

resource efficiency creates the ability for sound data driven business strategies. Two key points will need to be taken into consideration in 2020:

First, 2020 will be big data driven. Moreover, this data will have to be verifiable. Companies will have to stand behind facts and figures. Transparent data generation throughout the supply chain is the most fluid and efficient way in which verified data can be established. Moreover, a verified supply chain can reduce a company’s risk of finding itself in the middle of a PR nightmare.

Secondly, 2020 will continue to be purpose driven. Both the fashion and textile industry suffer from a lack of trust from consumers. Because of this, they must be conscious of how they move in the world around themselves. Looking towards the future, organizations such as Greenpeace have admitted they have gone as far as they can go with initiatives such as Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals (ZDHC). Greenpeace has made clear that fulfilling their set goals can only be realized with the support of government regulation and legal definitions.

Companies who are the first movers in transparent data sharing and analysis will be at the forefront of consumer trust and consumer loyalty.

As Bruno Pieters, founder of Honest by, stated, “If you don’t do it now, you’ll have to adapt when complete transparency becomes mandatory.”

Act now, follow THE BLUE WAY and be 20 years ahead.

Parley chips from marine plastic waste. In Fall 2019, a strategic partnership between Parley for the Oceans, PrimaLoft and Adidas was announced.

Bottom left: Extrusion of PrimaLoft Bio fibers Below: Raw material for PrimaLoft Bio.

Converting the yearly production of PrimaLoft Gold Insulation to P.U.R.E. manufacturing leads to significant emission reductions**.

Relentlessly Responsible

PrimaLoft is fully committed to sustainability in every aspect of its business. The brand is pushing the limits of material science forward, resulting in the perfect balance between performance and responsibility.

PrimaLoft’s mission to be Relentlessly Responsible™ has resulted in exciting breakthrough innovations within the past few years. In fall 2018 PrimaLoft® Bio™, the world’s first biodegradable*, 100% recycled synthetic insulation and fabric, was launched. The intention of this unique technology is to address the eventual end of life of a garment in an impactful way, while finding a solution for the industry-wide microplastics issue.

PrimaLoft Bio fibers are made from 100% post-consumer recycled material and break down when exposed to specific environments – such as a landfill or the ocean. The complete biodegradation process leaves behind only natural elements: water, methane, carbon dioxide, biomass and humus - a common component of potting soil. Independent third-party laboratory tests also confirmed that the process leaves behind no harmful substances and does not inhibit plant growth. PrimaLoft Bio fibers will only biodegrade when exposed to the microbes in landfills or ocean water. Thus, the material remains highly durable throughout its usable life cycle in a garment. Moreover, PrimaLoft Bio fibers are proven to be renewable for use in a circular economy. Beginning in fall 2020 products using PrimaLoft Bio will be available from various brands such as Jack Wolfskin, Maloja, Norrøna, Reusch and many more. Carbon emissions Recently, another industry-changing innovation was presented. PrimaLoft P.U.R.E.™ is a proprietary manufacturing technique that reduces carbon emissions by nearly 50%. This new standard in manufacturing technology allows the use of air, instead of heat from an oven, to produce PrimaLoft insulation - a brilliant shift in the process, that will make a huge difference in the environment. The initial insulation product being produced with P.U.R.E. manufacturing technology uses 100% post-consumer recycled material and has all the insulating and performance benefits of existing PrimaLoft Gold Insulation. Converting the yearly production of PrimaLoft Gold Insulation to P.U.R.E. manufacturing results in: 48% reduction of carbon dioxide emissions**, 348,111 lbs of carbon dioxide reduction** and 438,617 miles of carbon dioxide savings, which is which is equivalent to driving around the earth 17.6 times**. In the fall of 2020, Patagonia will become the first brand partner to incorporate insulation that is produced with the PrimaLoft P.U.R.E. manufacturing technology.

Partnership for the oceans Early fall 2019, PrimaLoft announced a strategic partnership with Parley for the Oceans and Adidas, that will take plastic intercepted from beaches and coastal communities and use it to manufacture high-performance insulation products. PrimaLoft is the first insulation provider in the textile industry to partner with Parley to develop products made from marine plastic waste. PrimaLoft engineers have met the challenge of developing a special method, one that allows for marine plastics to produce insulation products that meet the company’s high-performance standards.

Together with long-standing partner Adidas, PrimaLoft will join forces in the strategic development of high-performance, sustainability-conscious products. One key focus in this partnership will be the introduction of Adidas apparel that features PrimaLoft insulation made with Parley Ocean Plastic™. This collective collaboration between PrimaLoft, Parley and Adidas is a win for each brand, as well as the environment.

* 93.8% biodegradation in 586 days under ASTM D5511 conditions (landfill environment); 65.5% biodegradation in 639 days under ASTM D6691 conditions (marine/ocean environment). The stated rate and extent of degradation do not mean that the product will continue to degrade.

** Calculations based on single-year production of 40- 100gsm PrimaLoft® Gold Insulation. Calculations verified by independent third-party, SGS North America, Inc