Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to identify the reported indicators in corporate sustainability reports, other documents and the web sites of 14 apparel brands belonging to the Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC).
Design/methodology/approach
– A content analysis of the corporate sustainability reports, other documents and web sites of the 14 SAC apparel brands was conducted to identify indicators related to sustainability. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected on all reported sustainability initiatives, actions, and indicators. A normative business model was developed for the categorization of the indicators and a cross-case analysis of the apparel brand’s sustainability reporting was conducted.
Findings
– In total, 87 reported corporate sustainability indicators were identified. The study finds that there is a lack of consistency among them. The majority of the indicators dealt with performance in supply-chain sustainability while the least frequently reported indicators addressed business innovation and consumer engagement.
Originality/value
– This paper provides one of the first in-depth reviews of the indicators reported by apparel brands within their web sites and other forms of corporate sustainability reporting.
Understanding the complexity of sustainable fashion issues can be overwhelming and a barrier for fashion designers. A number of tools for sustainable fashion design have been developed to aid designers in the integration of sustainability into their design practices. We analyze these to determine their fitness for purpose. Among them, three categories (archetypes) of tools are identified: Universal, Participatory, and Assessment. We propose an innovation framework and a five-dimensional model of sustainability specific to fashion to facilitate the analysis of the tools. Using the archetype categorization may facilitate designers in identifying the most appropriate type of tool for a specific circumstance, depending on context and need.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.