Apparel brands ETP and Kuyichi are the latest of five brands to join Circle Economy’s Switching Gear project in order to explore circular business models and connect with a global network of rental and recommerce experts. Other core brands to the project are Swedish menswear Asket and retailer Lindex.
“Circular business models, such as resale and rental, offer commercial opportunities for brands to innovate their business model, while expanding the practical service life of clothing - allowing us to do more with less, and when intelligently designed, reduce the total environmental impact of the industry. In these vulnerable times, it is especially important that we continue to explore how new models can improve our resilience as a global community. With Switching Gear, we aim to accelerate these business models in the apparel industry by providing brands with the expertise they need and connecting them with the right partners to successfully launch a pilot by 2021.” says Gwen Cunningham, Circle Textiles Programme Lead
In partnership with Fashion for Good, the project has also established the Switching Gear Enabling Network; a network of over 40 rental and recommerce experts and service providers to support the four participating brands that join in their journey to develop and pilot a new business model. Members of the network include: ThredUP, RePack, Eileen Fisher, Style Lend, Lizee and The Renewal Workshop.
Dutch corporate wear brand ETP has set ambitious circularity objectives for itself, including the launch of a 100% circular collection and only using only circular packaging materials in 2025. In the shorter term, they also aim to replace all regular cotton by BCI or ecological cotton and polyester by RePET in 2020. Re-use is also not entirely new to them, with several re-use programmes being trialed to explore how keeping corporate wear in circulation can realise cost and environmental savings for the brand.
“Although an average turnover in our customers’ staff is about 15%, very little of their clothing is currently saved for re-use, with some clothing not returned to ETP and remaining at their locations. By joining Switching Gear, we expect to establish what the real potential of rental or resale models is in reducing costs, reducing pressure on natural resources, and extending the purpose of the clothing that we have already made.” says Esther Oostdijk, Director Product & Operations, and ETP’s CSR Officer
Denim brand Kuyichi is committed to accelerating circular fashion, with key action points for 2020 including: the implementation of design strategies for cyclability, increasing the volume of used garments collected by establishing take-back schemes in at least 10% of their stores, and finally, increasing the share of garments made from recycled post-consumer textile fibers.
“A recommerce (resale) business model is the perfect addition to our circularity ambitions, especially considering the durable nature of denim. We are excited to work with the Switching Gear project team on innovating within Kuyichi and developing the right model for our organisation. Kuyichi was founded to show all that is possible to run a more conscious business, we’re positive that recommerce will be no exception to this.” says Zoé Daemen, Corporate Responsibility manager, at Kuyichi
The past two decades have seen a dramatic decrease in the amount of times clothes are worn. Coupled with a shift towards fast fashion, average consumers today buy 60% more items than they did 15 years ago and wear them for half as long. 70% of closets usually go unworn and it is estimated that 33% of women wear items as little as 5 times before disposing of them.
The Switching Gear project, supported by the Laudes Foundation, is part of the Bridging the Gap initiative, a group of six organisations working to stimulate sector-wide collaboration, facilitate innovative technologies and the design of best practices to enable the implementation of circular business models in the fashion industry’s supply chain. Other strategic partners of the Bridging the Gap group include the World Resources Institute, WRAP, London Waste and Recycling Board, QSA Partners and Forum for the Future.
For press enquiries, please contact yasmina@circle-economy.com
To join the project, please visit the project page.
We work to accelerate the transition to a circular economy. As an impact organisation, we work to identify opportunities to turn circular economy principles into practical reality.
With nature as our mentor, we combine practical insights with scalable responses to humanity’s greatest challenges. Our vision is economic, social and environmental prosperity without compromising the future of our planet. Our mission is to connect and empower a global community in business, cities and governments to create the conditions for systemic transformation.
More than 50 businesses are now part of our membership community (from large multinationals to active SMEs and innovative start-ups) with whom we co-create practical and scalable solutions, making the circular economy happen. In addition, we work with cities, governments, CSOs, NGO’s, advisory boards and intergovernmental bodies. www.circle-economy.com
ETP designs and produces corporate wear collections exclusively for various companies in the Netherlands and abroad. We provide all required services and project management to take the ‘hassle’ from our customers hands. All this resulting in happy employees for the customer, who are proud of wearing their uniforms!
We are very pleased to be part of the Switching Gear project, to learn from and to share with the other teams! We trust that this project will bring us new insights and enable us all to take next steps in further developing sustainable and circular solutions.
ETP aims to design and produce the most sustainable - or even circular - product. With every choice that we make we weigh the possibility of recycling the garment as well.
In addition we assure that all other steps in our process are made as sustainable as possible. At the same time we strive to enhance awareness of our customers and their staff wearing our garments, of the need to change to circular models and their own role in the process. We are organizing and facilitating re-use, to create maximum use of the technical lifetime of each garment. Meanwhile we work on actual circular solutions for the materials that we use. ETP’s goal is the launch of real circular corporate wear garments before 2025. Collections designed together with and for our customers, that offer the best mix of sustainable /circular items. By developing, producing, wearing and recycling these, we contribute to reducing the negative environmental impact of our product.
To succeed in our mission, we need to create a business model that will last and enable all involved in this chain to close the loop.
For questions and information please contact us:
Barbara Schothorst, barbara.schothorst@etp.nl, +31 6 54798850
Esther Oostdijk, esther.oostdijk@etp.nl, +31 6 54374353
Kuyichi is a sustainable denim brand that was founded in 2000 to fight for a positive change in the fashion industry. All of their pure goods are produced in a conscious and innovative way, with a focus on quality denim with a perfect fit. Kuyichi stopped making seasonal collections and doing sales to make a statement against fast fashion. Instead, the brand chooses to inspire consumers to buy more consciously.
Fashion needs to rethink its take-make-dispose model.
With the COVID-19-stalled supply chains exacerbating the millions of tons of textile waste produced every year, keeping clothing out of the landfill has become more vital than ever.
In this episode of the Sustaining Voices podcast, Sourcing Journal reporter Jasmin Malik Chua speaks with Gwen Cunningham, lead of the Circle Textiles program at Circle Economy, and Jonas Eder-Hansen, public affairs director at Global Fashion Agenda, about what the industry needs to do to prevent textiles from becoming waste, the close interrelationship between consumption and disposal practices and why investing in recycling alone isn’t the answer.
“We’ve seen the consumer, between 2007 and 2014, buying 60 percent more and keeping the clothing for half as long as they used to. And so these materials are becoming post-consumer quicker than ever before.” - Gwen Cunningham, Circle Economy
While textile waste can be broadly categorized into two streams—pre-consumer and post-consumer—tackling the problem requires a multi-pronged approach. Waste is a symptom of an issue that requires new design approaches, life-extending business models such as repair and resale, and beefed-up infrastructure for end-of-life management.
Policy, too, isn’t emphasized in discussions nearly enough.
“I think the role of policymakers in actually addressing textile waste is something that hasn't really been accounted for. The ability to actually engage in constructive dialogue with policymakers is something that many brands and retailers have shied away from because policymakers are seen as to impose further regulation. But if you turn that around, policymakers can also help accelerate and shift the transition to the circular economy, including also scaling up some of those technologies that are necessary to address textile waste.” - Jonas Eder-Hansen, Global Fashion Agenda
Today marks a new beginning for the circular future of Amsterdam: We are excited to launch the long-awaited Amsterdam City Doughnut! For over a year, we have been working closely with our friends at Doughnut Economics Action Lab (DEAL), C40 Cities and Biomimicry 3.8 to turn the global concept of Kate Raworth's Doughnut into a tool for transformative action in the city of Amsterdam.
As a pioneering work in its field, the Amsterdam City Doughnut embraces a social and ecological perspective, while combining local aspiration with global responsibility. How can our city be a home to thriving people in a thriving place, while respecting the wellbeing of all people and the health of the planet?
While the streets of Amsterdam have become unusually quiet these days, the tool offers an opportunity to reimagine and remake our future in the city. It is at the core of the city's broader ambitions for becoming circular, the Amsterdam Circular Strategy 2020-2025. The new strategy is the culmination of a collaborative process with the Gemeente Amsterdam to co-create circular strategies for construction, consumer goods and food.
Read the Amsterdam City Doughnut here:
https://lnkd.in/dG_VQkB
Read Amsterdam's Circular Strategy 2020-2025 here: https://lnkd.in/dEkRxFA
Today, with generous support from the Mava Foundation, Circle Economy announces the Circle City Scan Tool: a digital tool that supports cities and regions around the world in creating an action plan for the transition to the circular economy. A prototype of the tool is now available through a closed beta programme, and we invite interested users to apply to join.
As the need for resilience in the face of global emergencies – from the current COVID-19 pandemic to climate change – becomes ever more pressing, the circular economy is increasingly gaining momentum within cities and regions as a viable strategy to achieve these goals– namely, to create cities that are liveable, thriving, and resilient.
However, data and evidence of the current state of the circular economy in cities is not readily available to decision-makers, and most are struggling to get insights on what the most relevant circular solutions for their context is.
The Circle City Scan Tool enables local governments to discover and prioritise circular opportunities for their city or region, based on proprietary and publicly available socioeconomic and material flow data, relevant circular case studies, and users’ input as to which sectors, materials, and impact areas are a priority in local agendas.
The tool builds on Circle Economy’s expertise helping cities and regions develop circular economy action plans over the last five years, including cities such as Amsterdam, Glasgow, Basel, Almaty, Philadelphia, and more.
On March 26th, the Circle Economy team will walk the public through the tool in an online webinar at 9AM-12PM CET. Interested parties can register through the webinar registration page.
The tool was developed in collaboration with organisations at the forefront of the circularity transition in their cities, in Switzerland, Finland, Czech Republic, Ghana, US, Canada, and Spain.
Circle Economy is now welcoming local governments, circularity consultants, project developers and circular solution providers to join our closed beta programme and help co-create the future of the tool. Interested parties can contact us to join through the tool’s contact form.
“Digital tools enable us to democratise access to the knowledge and expertise that cities and regions desperately need to get started on their transition to a circular economy. With the Circle City Scan Tool, we aim to enable municipal and regional governments to understand how circular economy thinking can be embedded in policies and in supply chains. In this way we can increase their capacity to implement practical and scalable circular economy solutions.” said Martijn Lopes Cardozo, CEO Circle Economy.
About Circle Economy
We work to accelerate the transition to a circular economy. As an impact organisation, we work to identify opportunities to turn circular economy principles into practical reality.
With nature as our mentor, we combine practical insights with scalable responses to humanity’s greatest challenges. Our vision is economic, social and environmental prosperity without compromising the future of our planet. Our mission is to connect and empower a global community in business, cities and governments to create the conditions for systemic transformation.
More than 50 businesses are now part of our membership community (from large multinationals to active SMEs and innovative start-ups) with whom we co-create practical and scalable solutions, making the circular economy happen. In addition, we work with cities, governments, CSOs, NGO’s, advisory boards and intergovernmental bodies.
For more information, please contact press@circle-economy.com
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Today, the Fibersort consortium presents the market ready Fibersort machine to the industry; a cutting edge automated sorting technology that revolutionises textile to textile recycling of post-consumer textiles.
The accelerating consumption and disposal practices in fashion cause textiles entering the market to reach their end-of-use rapidly. In North-West Europe alone, around 4,700 kilo tonnes of post-consumer textile waste is generated every year, a small portion of the global mountain of textile waste. On average, only 30% of these textiles are collected separately- the rest is lost within household waste. In the best-case scenario, these textiles are sold in the second-hand market both locally and internationally. The remaining textiles are considered non-rewearable textiles due to their unsuitability for the second-hand market or the market saturation that second-hand clothing is currently facing. Almost all of these textiles are currently being downcycled, incinerated or landfilled. Nevertheless, 24% of the textiles collected have the potential to be recycled into new textiles, but currently are not. These textiles represent 486 kilo tonnes per year, the equivalent to the weight of 50 eiffel towers!
Automated sorting technologies could enable the industry to turn non-rewearable textiles that currently have no other destination than downcycling, landfill or incineration into valuable feedstock for textile-to-textile recycling. One of these technologies is the Fibersort, a Near Infrared (NIR) based technology able to categorise textiles in 45 different fractions based on their fibre composition and colour. Over the past years, the technology has been optimised, tested and validated to prepare it for commercialisation. The Fibersort is now able to sort ~900 kgs of post-consumer textiles per hour.
The success of the technology is highly dependent on the end-markets that help transform textile waste into new resources. The Fibersort project partners Circle Economy, Valvan Baling Systems, ReShare, Procotex, Worn Again Technologies and Smart Fibersorting have worked with industry stakeholders to better understand these end-markets, assess the potential of the sorted materials and validate the business case of automated sorting as a key enabler of textile-to-textile recycling. Results from these activities are available through project publications and Fibersorted materials are now commercially available for other organisations to test their potential for textile-to-textile recycling.
There are clear opportunities to successfully integrate automated sorting technologies and recycled post-consumer textiles across the value chain. Over the past years, innovation has spurred across this sector of the industry. However, several challenges remain to ensure the long-term implementation of these technologies in relation to financial and technical feasibility as well as the opportunities to scale. Collectors, sorters, recyclers, manufacturers, brands and policymakers have both opportunities and responsibilities to address these challenges. Although the Interreg NWE Fibersort project reaches its ending date in March 2020, the partners in the Fibersort consortium expect to continue working towards this circular ambition, as well as encouraging others to join the journey.
On the 12th of March the Fibersort consortium officially launches the updated Fibersort technology and is hosting an online webinar to explore key project outcomes, share experiences of the collectors, sorters, recyclers, brands, and other stakeholders that made this possible and learn more about how each one of us can contribute to closing the textiles loop, welcoming feedback and insights from the industry to create lasting industry transformation.
About The Fibersort Consortium Partners
Collaboration between all different stakeholders in the end-of-use value chain is essential to the success of this project. The most critical steps in the chain that are needed to create industry transformation are represented:
Textile collection: Leger des Heils ReShare collects around 26 Kt of used clothing in the Netherlands annually. The non-rewearable portion of textiles that are collected generally represents profit loss (or breakeven) for collectors and sorters. However, through the Fibersort project, ReShare has strived to increase the value of collected textiles by creating a market for them in textile to textile recycling markets.
Textile sorting: Smart Fibersorting is a sister company of Wieland Textiles, a sorting company that processes around 9 Kt of used textiles annually. Smart Fibersorting had a crucial role in setting up and optimising operations of the demo plant as an extension of Wieland’s business to ensure optimal technological performance and an improved business case. With the development of the demo plant, Wieland textiles aims to establish a sustainable business model for recyclable textiles. This is a model that allows textiles to maintain, rather than lose, their value by becoming feedstock for textile to textile recycling processes.
Textile recycling: Procotex Corporation processes a wide range of fibres for various applications such as yarn spinning, automotive, mattress, geotextile and other industries. Procotex recycles natural, synthetic and technical textiles as well as preparing flax fibre for the spinning industry. Within the project, they have tested and validated the sorted fractions in their textile to textile recycling processes. Worn Again Technologies is a technology licensing company that is developing and will commercialise proprietary solvent-based processes that will enable non re-usable textiles and polyester packaging resources to remain in constant circulation, driving positive economic, social and environmental benefits. Within the project, Worn Again Technologies has analysed and tested the sorted materials based on their feedstock input specifications to ensure that textiles were separated and prepared in accordance with their recycling process.
Fibersort machine development: Valvan Baling Systems is market leader in the supply of automated sorting as well as baling systems. Within the Fibersort project, Valvan Baling Systems is leading the design, engineering, software development and construction of the Fibersort machine.
Market uptake: Circle Economy is a Dutch-based impact organisation. Our mission is to accelerate the practical and scalable implementation of the circular economy. At Circle Economy, we believe in a visionary future for our planet — one in which we do not have to compromise in order to achieve economic, social, and environmental prosperity. As an impact organisation, we connect and empower a global community to create the conditions for systemic transformation. With nature as our mentor, we work alongside businesses, cities and governments to identify opportunities to make the transition to the circular economy and provide a powerful combination of practical and scalable solutions to turn these opportunities into reality. Our mission is to empower a global community of businesses, cities and governments to accelerate the transition to the circular economy through practical and scalable insights and solutions that address humanity’s greatest challenges.
The Fibersort project is funded by Interreg NWE
Interreg North-West Europe (NWE) is a European Territorial Cooperation Programme funded by the European Commission with the ambition to make the North-West Europe area a key economic player and an attractive place to work and live, with high levels of innovation, sustainability and cohesion.
For more information and press requests please contact us at press@circle-economy.com
Businesses and Governments need to ensure jobs and skills are supported if the world is to realise ambitions for a circular economy. This is according to a new positioning paper, Jobs & Skills in the Circular Economy, State of Play and Future Pathways. The report marks the launch of the Circular Jobs Initiative, from Circle Economy.
Asset tracking, which includes monitoring the identity, location and condition of individual components or products, can effectively extend the economic lifetime of products, thereby bringing a host of benefits to companies. This is according to new results launched today by the Community of Practice (CoP) – consisting of Rabobank, Allen & Overy, Schiphol Group, Avery Dennison on behalf of the NBA (The Royal Netherlands Institute of Chartered Accountants), Circularise, Everledger, Fairphone, Sustainable Finance Lab and Circle Economy.
Looking at the benefits of asset tracking for Product-as-a-Service entrepreneurs, the CoP sets out to tackle the complexity of asset tracking by uncovering the best technologies and mapping the financial and legal implications of the process. To ensure that the research outcomes reflected reality they teamed up with Fairphone, who aims to launch a Fairphone-as-a-Service to businesses using their recently launched, easy to repair modular Fairphone 3.
Tracking mobile phone assets: overcoming barriers
Asset tracking is far from a simple or clear cut method to implement. It introduces a number of questions, namely; which technologies are most effective and can be implemented throughout the product value chain? And how do companies navigate strict data protection laws and regulations?
CoP’s partnership with Fairphone allowed for an on-the-ground investigation of ways to overcome such complexities. In its launch of Fairphone-as-a-Service to businesses, the Dutch company plans to use tracking to keep their products, and therefore the materials in them, circulating for as long as possible, and at their highest possible value. Tracking technologies could support this by optimising preventive and targeted maintenance and enabling efficient re-use of components.
By understanding the behaviour of individual components in the phones, and what affects their physical condition, Fairphone can improve circular decision-making. This revolves around the effective use of components, in regard to refurbishing, re-using or recycling and predictive maintenance. Within this project, the CoP focused on the phone battery, for which an app was built to read the most important battery-metrics: The charging temperature and the total charge. This allowed for software instructions to be written that model the condition of the battery, thereby ensuring it can be categorised and sorted without the need to open the device.
By tracking multiple components within the phone, invaluable data is gathered that can inform the future design of a product, further increasing the product lifespan, which is essential for Product-as-a-Service models.
For circular enterprises in need of an infrastructure that provides better grasp over their assets, tracking technologies generate insights that are indispensable for the transition to the circular economy. Circular business models can be improved and track records can be built, which ultimately can provide the comfort for financiers to, finally, take the plunge.
A transition towards a circular economy holds great promise for achieving a sustainable economic development. Yet, although the Netherlands has been one of Europe’s frontrunners when it comes to the recycling of materials, with 80% of all the waste generated being recycled, downcyclingrather than upcycling remains the rule, resulting in recycled material of lower value than the original. Moreover, far less attention has been paid to prevention, reuse and repair. The white paper outlines the roles played by new entrepreneurial ventures in the circular economy (called circular start-ups) to accelerate the transition towards a circular economy.
Take the example of BikeFlip, a circular start-up recently founded by five students fromUtrecht University. The young company wanted to find a solution to the many abandoned and neglected kids bikes in the Netherlands. It refurbishes and offers second-hand kids bicycles on a subscription model for a fixed monthly fee, including the maintenance and repair of bikes. When the child outgrows the bicycle, the customer chooses a new one and returns the old one, so BikeFlip can deliver itto another customer. This start-up can thus truly contribute to a circular bike economy in the Netherlands.
The researchers provide an overview of thebusiness models of 147 circular start-ups in the Netherlands and contrast them with those of large, well-established firms engaged in circular economy practices. They found that, compared to large established firms, circular start-ups develop more ambitious circularity strategies. “As new market entrants, circular start-ups can lead the way to the next level of circularity by developing circular innovations and disruptive business models”, says Julian Kirchherr, principal investigator of the research project.
Circular start-ups also face challenges, however. “It may be hard for a start-up lacking capital and economies of scale to enter a market that is already occupied by large players”, says Thomas Bauwens, lead author and post-doctoral researcher at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development at Utrecht University. Collaborations between circular start-ups and established firms are paramount for tackling these challenges. “Established companies can reach out to help circular start-ups, for example by unlocking their network, by acting as off-takers or by delivering production capacity”, Thomas Bauwens explains.
The white paper concludes by providing policy-makers and businesses recommendations to create a supportive environment for circular start-ups, for instance through the use of public procurements and tax policies to boost market demand for circular start-ups’ products and services. Marko Hekkert, director of the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development, concludes: “Setting the right contextual conditions in place is essential to unlock the potential of circular start-ups in the transition towards a circular economy.”
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