One lazy writer and a container
Welcome to "nouveau monde", your "nouveau genre" (see, we even create new words) newsletter to better understand how to make the world better through the lens of retail. This is #35
This week nouveau monde talks about containers and sustainable startups in apparel.
Things move fast in retail and sustainability, we’re really happy to help you get the right tips and be inspired !
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Today's newsletter is 1,247 words, a 3.58-minute read.
Less Corps, more Startups
by Phil
We often share in these lines what big corporations are publishing when it comes to advertise their ESG strategies/achievements/reporting God knows what else. So we dig, and we dig and we find and we inform you.
I wonder how you can really change things from the top. Speaking about digital transformation for instance, one says it works if changes come from the top of an organization. Would it work if it was to change the way products are built/transformed/processed? Because of some committees, regulations, CEO’s decision, suddenly everything would come clean? I don’t believe in Apparel’s transformation industry because some guy decided to make a few pants built in the North of France. You’ll understand my lack of inspiration this week. So I played my favorite game, scout some new plants.
They found a way to run all plastics out of sports apparel. “Our hemp products emit around 60% less CO2 in the production process compared to polyester products.”
Around 95% of all sportswear is currently made with some form of plastic. It is cheap and easy to manipulate with chemicals to make it water-resistant or antibacterial. By using only natural materials such as eucalyptus and organic cotton, they offer a plastic free alternative. Their high quality products make it as easy as possible to transition from polyester.
“During our research, we identified two main challenges within the clothing industry. The first was the lack of sustainable materials and the second were the bad labour practices. These two challenges are at our core and we aim to be leaders on both these fronts in the future. Currently, we are taking steps towards this goal by combining natural materials like hemp and lyocell with a fair supply chain. Our hemp products, for example, emit around 60% less CO2 during the production process compared to polyester products and don’t release any harmful microfibers into the ocean.”
Evrnu has invented fiber technology that transforms old clothing into new, high-quality raw materials. Working with brands, fiber producers, and mills, Evrnu creates and licenses fiber formulations with unique performance and environmental advantages. These engineered fibers are a solution to the greatest threats currently facing the industry: textile waste, resource consumption, and environmental damage. Evrnu uses 98 percent less water than what is required for virgin cotton production, eliminates 80 percent of typical pollutant emissions, and can be regenerated multiple times. Evrnu offers an environment-sparing alternative for the world's highest demand fibers -- cotton, polyester, and rayon -- and is currently being adopted by the world's best brands and retailers.
BlockTexx owns proprietary technology that separates polyester and cotton materials such as clothes, sheets and towels of any color or condition back into their high value raw materials of PET and cellulose for reuse as new products for all industries. BlockTexx is leading a global movement toward a circular economy for our customers and production partners, by developing planet focussed solutions that divert textile waste from landfill and into sustainable products.
“Sustainable fashion without the price tag”
Launched in 2018, Nuw is a free downloadable app available on iOS and Android that allows people to swap clothes and accessories in the UK and Ireland. App users upload a photograph and a description for each individual item from their wardrobe that they would like to swap or lend out. A Nuw team member then vets the listing and approves it within 24 hours so that it can be put on the individual's page. The items on the app are from its community of members, although brands could potentially get involved in the future. Users earn a "token" for each item that they list to swap. They can then use these tokens to swap or request an item on another user's page. Each swap costs 99p for UK or 99c for users in the Republic of Ireland, paid for by the person receiving the items. Users can message one another to request to borrow items for a flexible length of time. The person receiving the item pays for the item to be posted to them and sent back.
Circular economy is terminology that defines a shift in the traditional or ‘linear’ model of take-make-dispose, in which we consume finite resources and produce vast quantities of waste, towards new models that keep products and materials in use for as long as possible and enable them to be repurposed or recycled into new products at their end-of-life, never becoming waste. The Melbourne born marketplace is Australia’s newest re-commerce platform in which users are able to Rent, Re-sell and Recycle their items all in one spot.
Since launching in 2019, the new fashion marketplace has made it inherently clear that when it comes to sustainability and the green tick of approval, the fashion industry is, by all means, earning no brownie points. Responsible for 10% of global carbon emissions and 90 million tonnes of landfill waste, fashion ranks second when it comes to the world’s most polluting industries.From international to home grown, AirRobe features a variety of brands, including renowned household brand such as Celine, Chloe, Camilla, Acne Studios and Zimmermann. AirRobe users are able to easily track the carbon emissions saved and money earned within their account.
Paper Crown
by Anthony
Single use containers are a massive problem in a lot of industries, but its particularly true in the food and restaurant area.
And it really is a challenge to find the right solution : single use plastic or cardboard are really convenient solutions as they are pretty cheap, they don't take too much space and they require no cleaning or maintenance.
On the other hand, we have all these startups and services popping up to try and tackle this problem (we've talked about it here for instance).
Will they be able to solve the problem and propose a solution as convenient as the single use packaging ?
Well, in France, these services might have a precious help from the regulatory side : a law passed in 2020 will make single-use packaging forbidden in fast food restaurants when customers eat on the spot by January 2023. (see the summary of that law here, in French) Single use packaging represents 180 000 tons a year, just for fast-foods... And therefore a great opportunity for companies like the French Pyxo to develop their business.
In the US, we can talk about Dispatch Goods, which started its services in California and now expands in some cities.
For both startups, the key point is to be able to develop a very efficient supply chain that makes the use of reusable containers convenient.
The main challenges are :
being able to stock the containers
being able to trace containers, know almost in real time, where each of them is, where does it come from...
have a sufficient strong network of partners to stock, move, clean the containers
being able to offer the right size of packaging for the different needs of their clients
Both companies have started to work with restaurants but know that the market is huge also in other segments, like private customers, but it's another supply chain challenge.
And both companies have recently raised a few millions to be able to operate and grow, as it's a matter of "the winner takes all" the market, as often...
Let's see what happens and if we eventually manage to stop this packaging craziness !
Bonus track by Anthony
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