Kontoor continues down sustainability path
Denim brands Lee and Wrangler’s US-based owner, Kontoor, recently published its second sustainability report in its two and a half years as a publicly traded company.
Product highlights included what the group described as the sustainable souring of 50% of the cotton used for over 120 million units of clothing and accessories it produced in 2020. Its target is 100% sustainably grown or recycled cotton by 2025.
The perceived sustainability of Kontoor’s cotton fibre also extends to verifiable traceability, it said, from farm through production. The company stated that while its goal is full transparency, it has not achieved this ambition just yet. Therefore, it reported that it had scaled up engagement with its supply base “to build understanding and collaboration" and, ultimately, help it reach its goals.
In a similar vein, Kontoor underlined that it was on track to use 100% preferred chemistry by 2025 and, what is more, save 10 billion litres of water by the same year (on a cumulative basis since 2008).
Notably, 56% of all Lee Europe scored as “low impact” in terms of their wash formulations in 2020, according to Jeanologia’s environmental impact measuring tool.
