Guide to Ethical Sourcing: How to Buy
Investing in ethical and sustainable fashion is something that many consumers are embracing, but the fact is that the operating practices of clothing manufacturers are shrouded in mystery.
If consumers want to find out where their clothing comes from, how it’s made, and the social and environmental impacts of production, we need to spend hours digging into reports and data, poring through statistics and lengthy essays.
Buying ethically shouldn’t be a chore - and luckily, there are resources that have done all the hard work for you.
BaptistWorldAid’s Ethical Fashion Report
https://baptistworldaid.org.au/resources/ethical-fashion-guide/
BaptistWorldAid’s Ethical Fashion Report aims to empower you to be a more thoughtful and ethical fashion consumer. It does this by identifying the ethical policies, frameworks, systems and practices companies have in place across their supply chains to ensure labour rights and environmental sustainability. The report uses a grading system that rates companies from A+ to F based on how their labour rights and environmental sustainability systems and practices compare to their peers.
Good On You App
The Good On You app makes buying easy, pulling together all the information and using expert analysis to give each brand an easy-to-understand score. The app provides data on over 3000 fashion brands and measures the sustainability impact of fashion brands based on three criteria: labour impact, environmental impact and animal welfare, such as the use of furs and leathers. The ratings range from five stars ("Great") to one star ("We avoid"). It’s also full of handy news, tips, and style edits from the world of ethical fashion and lifestyle.
BCorp Certification
BCorp Certification is recognised around the world. It’s a clear signal that a business meets the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose. Comprising of almost 4000 companies in 150 industries through 74 countries, BCorp Certified legally requires that a company considers the impact of their decisions on their workers, customers, suppliers, community, and the environment.
KnowTheChain
KnowTheChain is a partnership between Humanity United, the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, Sustainalytics, and Verite. It benchmarks current corporate practices, develops insights, and provides practical resources that inform investor decisions and enable companies to comply with growing legal obligations while operating more transparently and responsibly. Each benchmark also includes company scorecards with company-specific recommendations and a full data set so companies know where and how they can improve.
DoneGood Extension
https://donegood.co/pages/chrome-extension
For users of Chrome, the DoneGood Shopping Assistant is a versatile browser plugin that automatically shows you brands that do good for people and the planet when you shop on Amazon, Google or other big-name retail websites. To generate the suggestions, DoneGood’s engine draws from data including B Corporation certification or fair trade practices, and will even offer ethical matches for companies that don’t meet its set of standards.
Fashion Revolution
https://www.fashionrevolution.org/
Held for one week every year, Fashion Revolution is the world’s largest fashion activism movement. It’s a collaboration between designers, suppliers, producers, academics, retailers, brands, policymakers, business leaders, and buyers - all working together to raise public awareness of the systemic challenges that exist in the global fashion industry. This year’s movement focusses on the “interconnectedness of human rights and the rights of nature… and will amplify unheard voices across the fashion supply chain and harness the creativity of our community to explore innovative and interconnected solutions.”
Discover our vetted and curated range of products by Ethical brands HERE.
← Older post Newer post →
